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Nanny Ogg never did any housework herself,
but she was the cause of housework in other people.
--Terry Pratchett
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2.25.02
In a pathetic attempt to avoid spring cleaning I'm doing everything else I can think of that could possibly loosely be construed as "organizing stuff," a subcategory of spring cleaning.
This includes getting all three of my websites in order. I have three websites because I have a short attention span, and at the time each seemed terribly important and fun. Right now, I'm only interested in this one, my personal journal.
However, the Heidi by Johanna Spyri website for kids that I kind of threw together in 1998 (I'm not being coy -- I really threw it together) has grown beyond all reason, and has a loud and noisy fan base who fill up my inbox wanting to know stuff, know stuff, know stuff. Which they have every right to do because several places within the Heidi site I have cheerful exortations to "email me!" and I may even have stupidly written "email me with questions!" and now people from all over the world think I'm an expert on Heidi, Johanna Spyri, Switzerland, the Alps, the whole package, when in fact all I've ever done is read Heidi a few times and make a website with pretty pictures. I'm in way over my head and I can't take it down because little kids everywhere will start crying and send me hate mail.
My point is, don't start a website unless you have the time and energy and interest to keep it up, because suddenly it will belong to other people and not just you, and they have rights.
No, wait, my point was, I usually love spring cleaning, or any cleaning. I seem to be going through a slatternly spell. I am usually like Monica on Friends regarding the whole keeping house thing (i.e., if inadvertently locked in the bathroom, I would first clean it, then scream for help). I wish I could do it full time and make a bazillion dollars doing it.
Nothing else I can think of satisfies so many of my needs simultaneously: the need to work, the need to see results from my work, the need to makes things pretty, and the need to clean house. Yes, the process itself is its own justification. I come from a long line of houseproud women, in the strong tradition of the German hausfrau, and I'm not messing around.
It's not always easy to keep up. Sure, many of those women weren't also working full time outside the home, but on the other hand, I have never had to wash my clothes using a wringer, or feed the farm animals, or pump water from a well. Or take care of kids, for that matter, since we have none. When I'm feeling particularly lazy, I just try to concentrate on the generations of women before me who have made it a major life priority to keep house. Spare me the feminist postmodern mumbo-jumbo, because those of us who think keeping house has value are not swayed by the rhetoric of our detractors.
Speaking of housewives, for a fun and food-related blast from the past, make sure to check out James Lileks' Gallery of Regrettable Food, and buy the book. (Today's graphic was swiped from this site.)
So anyway, I need to clean my house.
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