CONFESSIONS OF A MESSY HOUSEKEEPER

Our grandmothers had a system for getting things done. Each day had a chore. Monday was washday. Today we should have Tuesday and Wednesday off. There’s little or no ironing or mending that needs doing. Thursday was cleaning day in those olden times, and unfortunately there’s lots of that that still needs doing.

Friday was shopping day. I live within walking distance of stores, and order many items on Amazon or eBay so I don’t need a shopping day.

Saturday was a cooking day. The little cooking I do is usually making a pasta salad or heating up a veggie burger.

Then comes Sunday, and don’t we all need a day of rest. Except there are always chores that need doing even on a Sunday.

Nowadays most women have workdays. Several days out of each week, we must be busy doing someone else’s work. I admit that when I worked outside the home, lots of housework didn’t get done.

I would leave my classroom with piles of essays to correct, and wishes that I had become a math instructor instead of a writing teacher. Math tests can be corrected in minutes using a Scantron. I had to read each essay, sometimes more than once and make comments. I had to get grades in. I ignored the dirty floor, messy litter pans and the dirty dishes. Housework got done eventually, but it had little priority.

I retired at the end of 2013, and cleaned house. I went through all the rooms, sweeping, mopping, dusting and rearranging. It left me so exhausted, I didn’t do anymore housework for awhile unless it was necessary like cleaning litter pans.

Things quickly got dirty again.

I wanted to learn American Sign language, write a blog about learning better, and write a novel. I began writing the novel, and volunteering at an animal rescue group. Occasionally I would go to Youtube for an ASL lesson. I decided I would not be a slave to the household.

Now that I was home more, housework seemed to nag me. The dirty floors stared at me. Even my computer screen had smudges I hadn’t noticed before.

The months went by. The house didn’t look any cleaner, and I hadn’t learned much ASL. My novel was coming together, but the blog was a drain of my energy. I volunteered sometimes as many as five days a week for the animal rescue group, but that was just two hours in the morning.

It was also an excuse. Why wasn’t housework getting done. I was too busy.

This is really about time management, not chores.

The old Monday is washday schedule doesn’t work any more and not because I don’t iron, mend or cook. So many things like litter pans need to be done everyday need. Daily shores take up chunks of time, that I want to invest elsewhere.

I read everyday, write everyday, eat and sleep everyday. These are core activities for me. Eating and sleeping already had times carved out for them. Litter pans, another core activity, were done first thing every morning. I read in the evenings, after I am too tired to clean or even write.

Over the first year of my retirement a schedule evolved.

I put in time everyday for writing. I finished the novel, and now I can’t stop revising it. I started a second novel and a memoir. Occasionally I have a day where the best I can do is squeeze in fifteen minutes writing time, but it is an important fifteen minutes.

Housework is like that. I plan a chore, but something else comes up. My husband and I and Cinco, one of the cats have all had emergency room visits this year. We just contracted to have a steel roof put on our house. Solar panels will follow. These will mean interruptions, and I can’t always plan the day or time when the interruption will occur.

I have divided cleaning chores up. I clean the kitchen on Monday; utility room on Tuesday, office/living room on Wednesday. I have a room for each day. Sometimes I double up and do two rooms in one day.

What I need is reading time. I get depressed if I don’t read 70-100 pages a day. I am a reading addict. And the reading feeds the writing. I learn from good writers. So around five each evening I curl up with a book. This is my reward for cleaning, writing, shopping and volunteering.

CONFESSIONS OF A CRAZY CAT LADY

I wasn’t always a crazy cat lady, but I always had cats. I loved dogs more when I was growing up. But cats lived in the household too.

My parents loved animals, but they were not at first good pet owners. They let their dogs and cats outside. Even though we lived in the country, these animals soon died. Usually they were hit on the US-2 Highway that ran right in front of our house, or sometimes they just wandered off and didn’t come back. Life was usually short for an outdoor pet.

It was because of the neighbors that we started keeping our pets in. My mother fought ferociously with the neighbors. Even though everyone’s dog ran loose in the neighborhood, the family across the street called the police and complained about our dogs. Their teenage neighbor son actually drove off the highway to kill one of our cats.

I didn’t like these neighbors anymore than my mother did. Not after the son killed my cat, Maverick.

My mother was at fault for the fighting. While I think I am crazy in a good way, she was crazy in a bad way. She would stand out on the lawn, call the neighbors ugly names, and thumb her nose and butt at them. She never forgave anyone, not even for the slightest wrong or perceived wrong.

We had a pet chicken named Henny Penny who was not penned. When Henny Penny went pecking in Mr. Corona’s yard to the south of us, my mother ran out of the house shaking her fist at him and screaming, “Leave that chicken alone.”

After that she wouldn’t leave Mr. Corona alone. She yelled at him so much that he eventually built a tall wood fence around his yard, so he did not have to look at her or listen to her anymore.

The good that came out of the encounter was that she had to start penning Henny Penny who lived to be a very old chicken.

My mother’s craziness and her battles with the neighbors, are another story. The neighbors, especially the teenagers across the street had murderous thoughts about my mother, and unfortunately took it out on a few of the animals. We had to start keeping them inside, or as in the case of our one chicken and one rabbit, we had to start penning them in.

The dogs were tied outside most of the day and let loose when we walked with them down the tracks behind our house. They came in at night. The cats were kept in all the time.

I learned to keep pets safe by keeping them in.

Hairballs Happen

When I pulled my refrigerator out to clean behind it, I found a fresh hairball. I live with cats, so finding hairballs is not unusual. I took out the spray bottle of Lysol and quickly mopped it up.

Usually hair balls are left in places easier to find. The back of the refrigerator was a surprise even though Lancelot, one of my older cats, does go back there sometimes to sleep, and all the cats climb on top the refrigerator. They like high places.

It reminded me of an embarrassing hairball moment from a few years back. When I went to a faculty meeting. I sat at a table with half a dozen other college instructors. I reached in my purse to pull out a pen. Instead I pulled out a hairball.

Hairballs happen. Nowadays I make sure my purse is zipped shut when I am at home, and I glance at the insides before I leave

READING, WRITING, HOUSEWORK

I gave all my pets their monthly flea treatments. We piled the Advantage tablets on the counter. I had a list of pets; my husband and I checked off their names as we found an animal and applied the solution to their necks.

Afterward I washed all pet bedding and sprayed areas where the pets congregate and sleep.

I happen to be reading “The Magical Household” by Scott Cunningham and David Harrington, so, of course, I was interested in magical ways to eliminate fleas. Some readers will say they aren’t superstitious. Neither am I. Magic has been a part of human lives since the days of the cavemen. We are still magical people.

Do you knock on wood. throw salt over your shoulder or pick up pennies because they are lucky. If you have a St Christopher medal or rosary in your car, perhaps you believe it it will protect you. Religion purports to be magical I believe magic is all around us.

Anyway I paid special attention to the parts about how to magically remove fleas. Some magical people write polite letters to the fleas asking that they leave the pets alone. This letter can be placed outdoors on a stump. For some reason, the fleas eat the note, and leave the pets alone. I tried to to write a letter to the fleas. What do you say to a flea?

Please leave my pets’ alone. If they taste good, perhaps this letter will taste better. I will even write it in peanut butter or olive oil for your enjoyment. Thank you, dear little fleas.

Another way to get rid of fleas is to scare them away. Go through the household banging on a pan as if it were a drum. “Yell at the fleas. Tell them them that they must be gone. The book says to shout, “Out with you scorpions, fleas, serpents, roaches, bugs and flies.” Name any critter you ned to rid of. That might scare the neighbors and the pets. I don’t think it will have much affect on the bugs.

Another flea removal method is to burn a dish rag, the first time you hear thunder in March. You could also burn fleabane every day of summer.

I already missed too many days this summer to start on fleabane now.

Anyway we are free of fleas at least until next month. It may have more to do with the Advantage and the coat of diatomaceous earth I spread around the house.

NOTES FROM MY JOURNAL;

Flivver was a nickname for the Model T; it means ‘worthless headache.”

I went to Kingsford High School in Upper Michigan The nickname of our sports teams was the Flivvers because until the 1950’s, Ford had a plant in Kingsford. I wonder if whoever named the school’s mascot Flivvers knew what it meant.

Support your local butterflies: Place overripe fruit outside; it has nutrients that butterflies need.

Things I wouldn’t know were I not a reader: Julia Child helped the war department in World War II by developing an odd recipe. The ingredients included black dye, copper acetate, and water soluble wax. The purpose was not to eat, but to keep sharks from bumping into mines. This caused the mines to explode before their time. The concoction was used by the Navy for three decades and had the added advantage of keeping sharks away from sailors. From “Mental Floss. November 2014, page 47.

Thomas Jefferson was a smuggler. When he was minister to France, he went to Italy and smuggled out a type of rice that could be grown in dry upland regions. America needed this rice because up until then rice in the United States was planted in swamps where mosquitoes bred and made workers sick. The type of rice we needed in this country was only grown in Italy, and Italian law protected the rice seeds. The penalty for exporting the seeds from the country was death. Yet Jefferson filled his pockets, and then headed for the border. Same page in "Mental Floss"

FAIRY DAY

Fairy Day. These mischievous folks come out of their hiding places on May 4th every year. Leave an offering of bread, tea, raisins or bird seed for the fairy folk. Never leave left-overs. The fairies will feel insulted, and who knows what they might do to exact revenge.

Fairies have been known to steal small children, so keep an eye on your little ones today.

I often think that Persephone was stolen by fairies, and perhaps sold to Hades. Who knows?

If you are traveling, wear your coat, t-shirt,sweatshirt or hoodie inside out. That confuses fairies and protects you from fairy mischief.

GRATITUDE PRAYER TECHNIQUE FOR ANY RELIGION

Prayer method: Find a piece of string or ribbon about a foot or two long. Run your fingers over the silky material and think, “I am grateful, I am grateful, I am so grateful.” When it holds enough of your gratitude, take it outside to a place where birds will be attracted to it. The birds take your thoughts of gratitude with them to the heavens.

You might have a different gratitude ribbon every week or every month. We want to send our prayers to heaven often

This idea is from the "Witches' Spell-A-Day Almanac."