Cleanliness Is Next to Godliness, or at Least the Opposite of Dirtiness

Are you convinced? No? Me neither.

Nathan is cleaner than I am. I hate saying it this way because it sounds like I'm, you know, filthy, & I'm not actually that bad, but the reality is simply that my boyfriend is a cleaner, neater, more organized individual than I. Blame it on the military, if you will ("If you've got time to lean, you've got time to clean," he sometimes says, which he surely learned in the Coast Guard), but it's just not a level of cleanliness that I've got in me. He's forever asking me to unload the dishwasher or do the litterbox or unpack a suitcase from that trip I took two weeks ago, & I do my best to keep up because I'm not dirty, thankyouverymuch, but without him around, I'd just, um, move more slowly on these things. Anyway, I appreciate it & think it's great that one of us, at least, care about things like "dusting the horizontals."

This afternoon, we grabbed lunch at the Cinnamon Snail, my favorite (vegan!) food truck in all the land, & then decided to wander around downtown Red Bank & check out some of the places we rarely get to. After two hours of exploring, we made it home fired up &, surprisingly, ready to clean. Maybe it's the spring air or my new-found dedication to saving/making/finding money for a trip to Spain next year that's driving this, but lately, I'm all-hands-on-deck when it comes to getting organized & even minimalizing (which has previously been, shall we say, Not My Thing). I've been making piles of things to sell, things to donate, things to throw away forever, things to shred... so many things. I just want to get all the things in place, even & especially if that place is not in my home. Anyway, I came home from this long walk & felt inspired to do something moderately meaningful or at least, like, useful, & I decided that cleaning would be that thing.

I realized today that I have a few requirements for being a decent cleaner, most of them having to do with wardrobe:

1. On days I want to get a lot of housework done, I cannot take a shower. I mean, I can when I'm done, but usually, I'm a person who showers every morning (or, OK, on my lunch break), & ironically, if I want to be super-clean, I cannot clean, well, me. If I shower, get dressed, & put on makeup, I feel too prissy to get down & dirty. I don't want to waste a shower, yanno? Err... no? Just me?
2. Though I cannot shower on big cleaning days, I also cannot be a total hobo. If I stay in my pajamas & try to start cleaning, I'm always two steps away from taking a nap. When I sit down to sort through bills, I might just stay down... & start watching TV. Instead, I have to put on workout clothes -  usually leggings & a sports bras & a T-shirt - so that I feel like I ought to be moving.
3. Also, shoes. I have to wear shoes if I want to be serious about the cleaning. The logic here is that if I'm shoeless, I'm more inclined to take a nap. "That bed looks so nice now that I've made it! Perhaps I should give it a try?" But if I'm wearing sneakers, I always feel like I'm on the go, like I've got somewhere to be & simply cannot take the time to sit down on that newly lint-rolled couch with the recently fluffed pillows.

I got a lot done today. I'm still wearing my shoes as I type this, actually, because I wanted to feel compelled to finish it. Perhaps I've discovered the secret to my own all-around productivity...