The Creative Art of Housekeeping

What really does work to increase the feeling of having a home and it's comforts? Housekeeping creates cleanliness, order, regularity, beauty, the conditions for health and safety, and a good place to do and feel all the things you wish and need to do and feel in your home. 

Whether you live alone or with a spouse, parents and ten children, it is your housekeeping that makes your home alive, that turns it into a small society in it's own right, a vital place with it's own ways and rhythms, the place where you can be more yourself than you can be anywhere else. 

~ Cheryl Mendelson, Home Comforts - The Art and Science of Keeping House

Do you ever look around at the end of a long day, in which a large portion of the time was spent doing mundane housework - cooking, cleaning, laundry and organization and wondered if it was really worth the effort? Or did you have a quiet sense of satisfaction, knowing you had made your corner of the world a better place? I've ended days both ways and often with mixed feelings. 

I love the passage quoted at the beginning of this post and i'm going to go through it here bit by bit with some commentary.

In the first sentence, a question, I believe the author is acknowledging that feeling we so often get that there's really very little use in these pursuits. Especially if there are children and maybe a few pets, it often seems things come undone as fast as they are accomplished. And I've been know to say, half seriously, that I don't expect it to stay clean, I just don't want the dirt to get too deep. But there truly is value in these efforts that may not be seen at first glance. 

Look at the list of blessings that good housekeeping  creates in this quote: cleanliness, order, regularity, beauty, the conditions for health and safety. That's quite a list with some very significant benefits. Somehow I'm not taking my housekeeping skills (or lack thereof) quite so lightly now. 

And I love the second half  of the sentence ". . . and a good place to do and feel all the things you wish and need to do and feel in your home." In other words, the work that goes into creating a clean, orderly, beautiful home helps to create a place where each person can truly be the best version of themselves, do their best creative work, grow in mind, body and spirit, and show love and respect for other family members or guests in the home. 

The author goes on to say "Whether you live alone or with a spouse, parents and ten children, it's your housekeeping that makes your home alive. . ." When I first read this I thought is was a bit of an overstatement. But as I thought back in my own experience to the times when my home was most neat and orderly and how different it felt from the times when is was most disorganized and out of order, I realized just how much truth there really in this statement. 

". . . . that turns it into a small society in it's own right, a vital place with it's own ways and rhythms." I think this is my favorite part of this whole quote. I like the idea of my home, my family and life at Walnut Acre being like a small society with it's own unique ways and it's own beautiful and productive rhythms. And if it's a healthy and thriving society it will have a positive impact on the larger society around it. Idealistic? Maybe. But I'd rather reach for an ideal than settle for the mundane. 

". . . the place where you can be more yourself than you can be anywhere else." Once again the idea of home being the place where one can be one's best self is brought out. This is what I want for each of my family members and for each person who comes into my home. 


Suddenly housekeeping does seem to be such a mundane set of chores after all, but rather a privilege, a blessing and a creative art.

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