The fresh smell of clean

Let me begin by explaining that I hated the night before cleaning day when I was younger. There was a requisite period of time on Tuesday evenings when we all rushed around the house picking up the random piles of crap that somehow accumulated over the course of the previous days and weeks. We ensured that the floor was clear of obstructions and that the house was in good order. In my juvenile mind, I wondered why we cleaned before someone came to clean our house. I did not question the legitimacy or fairness of having someone come to our house and clean it. I associated the cleaning day with chores for me. What a twat I was.

In college, I serendipitously lived alone in a former janitorial closet for my first year. The walls were six feet wide. I know because I could spread my arms and palm both walls. Later, I had the  had the fortune of living with fastidious roommates. One of my older roommates, PhD student who we affectionately called Grandpa because he was eight years our senior and clocked in at a whopping 28 years old, cleaned the house so well that I never knew it to be unkempt or dirty.

Over the past decade, I have come to enjoy a clean house myself. I have learned from Chez Larsson to enter the house and immediately take care of mail by "binning it" or filing it. Years of reading Apartment Therapy have taught me more than the value of modular and moveable furniture. I have learned to wash the dishes and place a load of laundry in the wash before hitting the sack. In the morning, I often take a moment to swap the laundry out. I corral messes in the room, much to Kelly's chagrin, with boxes and cabinets. My own homegrown fastidiousness does not come without compromise, though. I rarely take the time to clean the windows. Kelly's purview is the ritual cleansing of the floors. Early in our marriage, I realized that my mother's genes go beyond the Norwegian good lucks and stubborn demand for the very best. I, too, enjoy the smell of a home filled with the aroma of Pine Sol and bleach.

So, Kelly and I made a promise to ourselves. We are both headed back to work after a little time with Mads: in January for me and in March for Kelly. We will need help and cannot demand that our parents roll up to assist. I now realize that cleaning might be a bit ritualistic for me, but paying someone else a bit of our hard-earned cash to clean our home is not bourgeois or frivolous or wasteful. It is a valid expense, liberating in that I will spend less time demanding that we clean and more time enjoying my time with Mads and Kelly. For that reason, let me show you a picture that made me smile with glee and perhaps dance a bit. When we returned home from FCPS central, Gatehouse to be exact, I witnessed a cleanliness that I have not heretofore (come one, who uses that word anymore?) experienced.

I, too, now have the pleasure of arriving home and experiencing that moment of bliss that my mother did. Pure, unadulterated olfactory and opportunity cost joy.