It’s that time of year again. Spring. Allegedly. They’re promising more snow in my part of the world, so we cannot be complacent, but I’m with the daffodils and snowdrops and crocus that are blooming anyway. I’m with the blue-tits who are busy nest-building in a box on my neighbour’s wall. I’m with the geese who are leaving their winter sheltering grounds. I’m with the days that are lengthening and lightening. I’m with all of nature that is trusting that Spring is coming.
What’s a bit more bad weather between friends? We’ll deal with it if arrives. And if it does arrive, it will also leave. I’ve known snow in May, so March is not that unusual. The forsythia is in flower, and the plum-cherry-whatever-tree over the road. The frost got the fuchsias but I’ll wait until it’s well past before I hack them back to see if they want to give it another go.
I haven’t cut the grass since last year’s drought. I’m waiting for a few dry days. They’re coming one at a time for now. Or if they rattle up in twos and threes, they wait until I’m away. I don’t suppose the grass minds being raggedy. The turkey-tail loves that I haven’t been tidying up.
I will get out there soon. More daylight hours serve to highlight all the jobs that need doing, but not right now. Right now, the indoors needs sorting. It is that time of year again. Spring cleaning time. Cards on table: me and housework are not best buddies, but every year when the days get longer the dust and the cobwebs peer at me more accusingly, I set out to spring clean.
I don’t think I’ve ever actually completed it. Some years I’ve only managed one room before life intervened or there were more interesting things to be doing. But every year I decide that this is going to be The Year. This is the year that I will clean from top to bottom.
There are supporting circumstances this year. The pool is closed, so no swimming in the mornings. My coastal writing group has ended its winter season and the spring one will be delayed this year. I’ve just had a round of social catch-ups: lunches and dinners and afternoons. This month’s trip is a simple overnighter: two days only.
No excuses, is what I’m saying.
So. I made a plan. My place is small enough. I can divide it into 6 “rooms” and get it done in a week. In theory.
Is it just me? Or does everyone else have this thing, where “cleaning” really means “re-discovering all those abandoned projects” that you start to wonder if you really can do something with? And “unearthing the filing" which isn’t just papers to be put away but stuff that needs to be checked and actioned first? And finding that the TBR pile is even higher than you thought, but you still can’t bring yourself to just discard any of those unread books?
And that’s just the back room.
Is it just me? Or does cleaning one room inevitably involve shifting some things to another room
to be dealt with later?
I need new rules for Spring Cleaning. I need rules that tell me that some things must, MUST, be discarded. Sold, donated, dumped, whichever is most appropriate but they need to be out the door. If I am ever going to simplify my life then surely spring cleaning time is the time to ramp it up.
But there is still the resistance. There is still the insistence that none of the books in the TBR pile or already on the shelves will go without my having attempted to read them. And thinking ahead about clothes in boxes and in drawers, neither of which got opened in the last twelve months.
Perhaps it’s the language that’s not working for me. Perhaps I need to step away from Spring “Cleaning” and find my way towards Spring “Clearing”. Two different things. I’m not there yet, but will come back to this idea.
For now though, let me tell you how ridiculously pleased I am to have fully cleaned one room. This room. The one where I type up my scribbles. The one where I email my friends. The one where I practice TaiChi. The one from where I look out on my zen space. The one from where I see blue tits and sunrises. The one where most of my books live – though to be fair, just about every room in my house houses books. I call it the back room. I resist everyone else's attempts to call it 'the office'.
I have moved all the furniture to clean underneath it. I have washed the windows. De-webbed the corners of the walls and the cornices. Dusted every shelf of the bookcase and every book top and every stone and piece of drift wood. The Snoopy pen holder Louise bought me for a birthday some time way back in the mid-to-late 20th century has been washed. Pens have been tested and the dead ones thrown away.
I’ve looked into the boxes of guide books – and decided they are not now boxes, I’ll get to them some time. For now I’ve wiped down their outsides.
I’ve indexed and backed up the videos that I don’t want to lose, and thrown away boxes that Clive kept, for equipment I have in near-daily use. Old photos have been found a temporary home away from the light and the dust. The desk has been re-organised.
I’ve rinsed the khata scarves, gently, to wash away the dust but protect the fragility of them. They’ll be draped back where they belong as soon as they’re dry.
The room feels as good as it ever did.
That’s the point about this whole spring cleaning / spring clearing lark – it’s about how it makes the space feel. Cared for. Loved.
And then maybe, that makes me feel the same way.
Day Two and One Room done. I'll be back next week...
