. . . Next to Godliness
You know it’s time to do a little house cleaning when you walk across the kitchen and a slipper sticks to the floor. Things have gone too far when neighbours write “Please wash me!” on your windows.
At times like these, there is one sure-fire way to deal with the problem—invite someone over for dinner. Nothing motivates me to clean the house like the fear of people finding out how we really live.
Please understand; my wife and I would like to have a tidy house. But after our full day at work, we barely have the energy to pronounce simple words, much less dance around the place with a mop and sponge. Our approach to house cleaning is, “If I can endure the mess another day, maybe the other person will take care of it.”
Lori my wife can always out-wait me when it comes to the kitchen rubbish. She has a knack for balancing empty bottles, cans and cereal boxes on an already-full container, until the rubbish towers like the Matterhorn. She could let the kitchen and half the livingroom fill with debris waiting for me to crack and take it out—which I eventually do.
I, on the other hand, will let the bathroom deteriorate to the point where even a returned Liberian aid worker would fear to step in the door. When Lori can’t stand it any longer, I see her heading into the bathroom wearing rubber gloves and carrying a long-handled brush like someone about to do battle with the Ebola virus.
The wait-and-see method of housecleaning has serious shortcomings as far as the refrigerator is concerned. Sometimes Lori will discover a plastic tub hiding behind the mayo that she’s afraid to open. She will leave it on the counter, its side bulging, in the the hope that I will have the courage to unleash whatever living thing is breeding inside and chase it into the rubbish bin.
Neighbourhood kids in search of a last-minute science project stop by and ask what we have growing in the fridge. It makes me wonder if the cure for the common cold might be evolving right now on last June’s macaroni salad.
Of course, everyone has different sanitary standards. In my opinion, premarital counselling should test for cleaning compatibility. It might include a walk through the apartments of each of the betrothed.
“All right, Susie,” the counsellor might say. “We see that John is cleaning engine parts in his bathtub. Can you live like this for the rest of your life?”
Or the counsellor could ask probing questions of the future bride and groom. “Let’s say a lasagna explodes in your microwave. How long would each of you let this go before cleaning it up?”
If their answers differ by more than, say, seven days, call the wedding off.
Professional testing is necessary because you can’t tell the truth about your intended just by visiting their flat. Remember, when you visit before you’re married, you are company. Presumably your beloved has tidied up in anticipation of your arrival.
Before our nuptials my wife could only guess that my standards of cleanliness fell somewhere above that of a group of 10-year-old boys on an un-chaperoned camp-out, but below our neighbour, who won’t let his wife do the vacuuming because she doesn’t leave perfectly straight lines in the carpet.
After the honeymoon, Lori found out that I have a short attention span for cleaning. I’ll be washing dishes and pretty soon I’ll say to myself, This is not the rewarding experience it was when I began. I think I’ll do something else helpful around the house, such as check to make sure the TV remote works properly.
Every so often I make a stab at cleaning up the paper clutter in our house, but then I think, What’s the point? The Post Office employs people full time to drop off a fresh load every day of the week.
I guess that in view of the conflict of the ages, our daily battle against grime and clutter is a trivial thing. The devil might make us feel guilty about the dust piling up under our beds, but I’m not sure God would. Judging by what Jesus said, it’s more important to be clean on the inside.
Reprinted, with permission, from Women of Spirit.
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