Pretty/Smart

Housekeeping Part One

prettysmart — Fri, 22 May 2009 07:03:05 +0000

I thought I’d write a series of posts about why Flylady works and the process by which I became a relatively clean and tidy person.

A lot of people live in big messes. A small number of them are physically incapable of cleaning up the mess or do not have the time to clean it up. This is only true of a very small number of people, however. Most people’s problem is that they have the wrong attitude about the mess. With the right attitude, even most people with serious physical limitations or time constraints can clean up their mess. Even people with serious physical limitations AND time constraints can do so.

You winced at that attitude stuff, didn’t you? Or you got angry? You felt bad. You felt shame, or maybe irritation, or maybe anger, or maybe all three.

One of the new things I do post-Flylady, that I didn’t used to do, is what she calls “taking a lick at a snake -” taking the opportunity to do whatever small cleaning or organizational task prevents itself at any given moment. If there is a giant pile of laundry to put away, put away one pair of socks as you walk past it. If you see a bit of black guck behind the bathroom sink faucet while you’re brushing your teeth, grab a piece of toilet paper and rub it off. If there is a giant unsorted pile of papers on the kitchen counter, and you recognize one as trash, chuck it in the trash can.

Maybe you don’t have the time to attack the whole monster, or maybe you just don’t have the desire. But you can put away one thing, clean one part, throw away one piece of junk.

Why does this work? Well, if you try it and observe your feelings, you may have the common experience of being overwhelmed with feelings of self-loathing upon confronting the hugeness of the task. I used to be like that. It hardly happens at all any more. I don’t know if the practice of putting one small item away really makes a difference in the mess – if a fairy followed behind me and put all my one-at-a-times back, would it really change how fast things got cleaned up? Does the real cleaning happen when it’s big cleaning? I don’t know. But no one wants to do big cleaning when they have that nasty voice in their head.

Blogging with Children

prettysmart — Wed, 20 May 2009 04:45:28 +0000

Christopher Robin Milne, as is well known, was distressed by the fame of his fictionalized self. Madeleine L’Engle’s youngest son was not well served by her use of him in her fiction either. If I apply the Golden Rule I must admit that I would very much dislike to see my own childhood in a parent’s prose. But perhaps the young people of today feel differently. After all, they don’t seem to have the same feelings about privacy that those of us who grew up before the internet have.

People who don’t know very much about children might imagine that you can simply ask. You can with some children, if you know them well, if you are prepared to hear what they answer, if they care more about their own wants than about pleasing you. That’s a lot of if’s.

I don’t think that everyone who writes about their children, online or off, is exposing them inappropriately. I try to assume, even when the evidence points strongly the other way, that people are making the best decisions about the little people in their lives, whom after all they know much better than I do.

I think also making art or just a blog post out of life must not interfere with other people’s relationships the way I fear it does with mine. I don’t even much like taking pictures. Life is fleeting and trying to capture the perfect moments is as easy as capturing a soap bubble.

What do you think?

Woe

prettysmart — Tue, 19 May 2009 05:28:37 +0000

Tomorrow I had time blocked out to post.

The person who was going to take the children away and be nice to them while I posted can’t come.

Why?

She has rats.

Dear Diary

prettysmart — Mon, 18 May 2009 01:34:05 +0000

Today I was surprised by it being First Communion Sunday at Mass and enchanted by the little girls in their white dresses and the little boys in their suits – but readers, when did little boys stop wearing short pants? I was seriously less enchanted by the rest of my day, which I am sad to report took place mostly at a mall. It’s very depressing spending a beautiful day at a mall, and thinking about the all other people in the area doing fun things outside, while you’re stuck looking at pictures of models pretending to do fun things outside.

I’m planning on buying a bicycle and a trailer soon to haul my offspring around in. This will be much more fun than the mall.

Quiz Results for Retro Blogging

prettysmart — Sun, 17 May 2009 23:58:48 +0000

I can’t publish this quiz result, and I want to so bad, because it says I am Xena. I bet if I stand here and flail someone will come along and help.

In other news, I saw another issue of “Artistic Blogging Magazine” at the bookstore today. What?