The Futility of Cleaning My Apartment

There is something truly transformational that happens to me between the end of my work day and my arrival to my apartment.

I’m still working on the many factors that are involved, but I’ve done the math and concluded that no matter the circumstances, I’m still almost 50% likely to mutate into a terrible, heinous beast.  Upon entry, I first look to the kitchen counter, which is usually covered in the filth I’ve left there from the night before.  Then I’ll shoot a wary glance to the sink, which is stacked to the brim with pots, pans, and strange, festering bacteria.

That’s when the mouth froth begins.

While I’m deep breathing through the sudden recollection of my own filth and disgrace, I move to the living room and am promptly greeted by whatever materials I was using to entertain myself the evening before.  Without a doubt, all those same things will return to their exact same places every single night, and yet every single day when I come home I feel as if I have to put them all back in their homes.

By the time I hang up my coat and put down my bag, I’m determined to clean everything in sight.  All of it.  I want it gone.  I’m in danger of becoming a fully fledged fire-breathing dragon of cleanliness and no nonsense if I don’t act soon.  So I go change out of my office work clothes and into my house work clothes  and I begin to a whirlwind attack of adulthood all over my apartment.   I’ve done it so often and so forcefully that I’ve gotten it down to a pretty consistent 20 minutes.  That’s all the longer it takes to make my apartment look like no one lives in it.    Because that’s the goal, right?

Cleaning is so futile.  What’s the point of putting away things I’m bound to get out again eventually and use in exactly that same spot?  Why do I feel like I have to hide all evidence that I live in my apartment when other people come over?  Who made these ridiculous rules?

I’m not sure what I expect to happen to the mess I made after I left it there without any pixie dust or magical cleaning dwarves.  But somewhere in between my leaving a mess, sleeping, working for 8 hours, and returning to the mess, I’d like to think that the house cleaned itself. I mean after all, I worked a full, hard day.  Once, just once I’d like the cats to pitch in.  But every day without fail they’re lounging around with their white, furry bellies up toward the sky.

They’re such non-contributors.

So I will carry on with my burden.  Or, after enough calculation, I will be able to determine the precise factors that are most likely to bring me to this mutant state of mind and I will change them and be freed from this hex placed on me.  Or I could just stop playing along with society’s rules an accept that when I use things often, they will often be visible and on-hand.

Except, of course, for when my mother visits. ♣

Tags: 365 Project, Humor, life, musings, postaday2011