I’m not obsessive about neatness or cleanliness, but I definitely would tend toward neatness. I like everything to have a place and everything to be IN that place. But when it comes to cleaning, I view it as a necessary evil. I genuinely enjoy tidying up. I only clean because I must.
For example, we have lived in our home for 7 years and the natural wood baseboards in our living room haven’t been dusted a single time. I mean…they don’t look dusty and they don’t have much of a ledge. But still.
And I am definitely not a germaphobe. I take regular basic precautions to keep things clean and sanitary, but that’s where it ends.
You may all shrink back in horror at this admission, but we are also not a family that washes our hands before we eat. I KNOW! I KNOW! But we also don’t seem to get sick as often as some people I know that are fastidious about this, though I refuse to draw any connection. I didn’t grow up washing my hands before meals and so it’s simply not a habit. If the kids come in from playing and are visibly dirty, I’ll have them wash their hands but if not…the meal goes ahead. I’m sure many of you are shuddering right now.
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Your turn. Are you clean, neat, both or neither. Do you wash your hands before every meal?
Header photo by Sincerely Media on Unsplash
Melissa
We don’t wash hands before every meal either. I do wash my hands before I cook and before I eat if I’ve been playing with Riley. I like things to be tidy, and would love everything to have a place but I don’t love tidying or cleaning. I do what’s required though so that I’m reasonably happy for people to drop in unannounced. I also don’t like a heap of visual clutter, but sometimes it does pile up and I can ignore it if I decide to.
Elisabeth
This makes me feel better, Melissa. We don’t have any dogs and I also feel like I wash my hands A LOT because I spend a lot of time in the kitchen cooking and cleaning and seem to be in the sink constantly.
Kyria @ Travel Spot
Shudder! Just kidding. I wash my hands before eating, especially when I’m eating with my hands or have been out and about. If I’ve just been at home a lot, I may not do it. Also, when camping, there is not always a chance to do it, so in that case, I eat cheese and chips with dirty hands. So sue me.
Otherwise, I am very, very tidy and I like everything to have it’s place, even the milk on the fridge. I hate wasting time searching for something that should be where it’s supposed to be ans usually, if it’s just me, I don’t have to. I am also clean, but, like you, do not sweat the small stuff. I lived in my house for ten years and only cleaned the baseboards once before I painted them. However, I am much more diligent in the kitchen, and I clean that every day, sometimes many times a day. We’ve talked about sheets and bathrooms; I am a once or twice a month person for both…
Elisabeth
I feel like I don’t eat a lot of foods with my hands, but I know the kids eat plenty of snacks with dirty hands (though I think in younger grades at school they had time before snack and lunch where they were specifically taken to the bathroom to wash their hands – and then probably touched every door knob and wall on the way back to their classroom and ended up being exposed to way more germs.
It would be hard to stay on top of hand washing on the trail!
And you’re making me feel a lot better about my baseboards. I dust the white ones in our basement (they have a wide “lip”) a few times a year but the ones in our living room are just not on my radar. In general, I loathe dusting.
I washed various sets of sheets this week so I’m feeling very impressed with myself!
Nicole MacPherson
I am both. I am not a germophobe though. I always insisted on the boys washing their hands when they came in the house from outside, and we wash before dinner. When I’m cooking I wash my hands a lot. I like a very neat house, and it’s also clean, although of course there are things that fall by the wayside. I mean, there is no keeping up with the floors, but I try.
Elisabeth
Floors. FLOORS. Sometimes I want to go into a dark room and sob. They don’t stay clean for like…twenty minutes.
We’re quite neat, but I wouldn’t call it very clean. *Sigh*
That said, when both kids were away at camp, the house was spotless so I’m not trying to draw any conclusions but…ahem…some people might disproportionately contribute to house chaos.
Jenny
Um. Weeeelllll… I’m not neat or clean. But that sounds bad, somehow. I mean I do shower! And I wash my hands quite a bit- like if I come in the house from outside, and definitely frequently while I’m cooking. It does make me happy when the house is neat and clean, but I live with people who don’t really care that much, and I don’t want to run around picking up after people all day long. So we just live with a low-level mess. Luckily for us we have people coming to the house in a regular basis (my daughter’s flute and guitar teachers, plus she frequently has friends over) which encourages us to tidy up.
I’m definitely not a germaphobe! I figure, I have an immune system- might as well give it something to do.
Elisabeth
I laughed so hard at: I mean I do shower!
Me too. I probably wash my hands the most of anyone in the house because I spend more time than anyone else in the kitchen and I do find myself washing my hands all. the. time when I’m cooking or cleaning up.
I am completely blind to other people’s mess (unless it’s suuuuppper messy and dirty), but clutter in my own house bugs me. I always chuckle when someone else apologizes for how messy their house might be because I honestly don’t care at all. But then when someone comes to my house and I haven’t had a chance to clean up I feel the need to apologize and I’m assuming they also don’t mind my clutter. Ah, social norms…
Diane
I’m definitely not a neat person. But clean kind of depends- like bathrooms- I definitely like bathrooms being clean. My bathroom is cluttered but clean. My own body/ my kids- well…. Daily showering is pretty optional, every couple of days is fine.
I do like having kids wash their hands when they come in the house. When I was growing up, there was a bathroom right off our entryway so it was habit to wash our hands as soon as we came home.
Elisabeth
We regularly quote a line from the movie The Incredibles where one character asks her brother. “Did you wash your hands?”He says Yes. Then his sister asks:…”With soap?” At which point he darts back to the bathroom.
I like things being clean I just don’t like cleaning. I definitely lean toward neat over clean, I think because I genuinely enjoy tidying things. I suspect if I really liked the process of cleaning I might not be so keen on the tidying part?
Steph
I’m neither, though tend toward clean over neat. I truly wish I was both, but I am who I am. Much of my adult inner work has been disentangling the moral value that I put on both of these characteristics (and outsourcing! ;)).
I have benefited from both professional cleaners and an organizer. I feel like you could become the latter with your awesome skills. 🙂
Elisabeth
Moral value around these things can be such a heavy weight. “Cleanliness being next to godliness” is something that gets internalized at various levels (especially for certain subsets of the population). I don’t feel like I grew up with that motto, so I think I’ve been fortunate not to assign too much moral weight to it. When I was a teen I was quite messy, my parents are quite cluttered to this day (though my mom cleans the house religiously each and every Thursday and has for decades), and even when I was a new mom I didn’t really care about piles and full shelves. It was as we added a second child, no more space, and a lot of work equipment that I started to feel so overwhelmed and claustrophobic. I couldn’t increase the space we had, but I COULD get rid of things. And that’s when I really leaned in to organizing and minimalism and I’ve never leaned out 🙂
I think I would love being a professional organizer. When someone complains about how messy their house is I really want to come over and set things right! I can’t think of something I’d want to do less than be a professional cleaner. We had a cleaner for several years and it was lovely, though I found myself doing a lot of work before she arrived and being so grumpy with how quickly things got dirty again, so we stopped with outsourcing. Now I’m having the kids do more home chores. It might not be a super high standard of cleanliness but it’s done and they’re learning some basic skills about how to care for their own homes one day!
mbmom11
I prefer to be neat – the house has everything in its place. I would like to be clean – I do vacuum and do bathrooms and mop, but dust under the dressers can stay there until I feel like moving things around. If we have guests, I’ll do some more cleaning (no cobwebs to embarrass me!) If I were to stop working, I probably would go on a major deep cleaning binge. But until then, we’ll muddle through with dust on the ledges.
Washing hands – if the kids haven’t been outside lately, no, not before a meal. (The kids are very good about washing hands after the bathroom, so I think they’ll be okay.) Again, we’ve survived this long. My husband washes his hands every time he comes in (which is probaby a good habit) but the kids didn’t pick that up.
Elisabeth
My kids are good about the bathroom. One more than the other, I will admit (guess which one), but I feel like I rarely have to remind these days.
I’m like you. I would like things to be cleaner, but not enough to invest the time. Tidying things calms me down so I use it as an act of self-care (which sounds ludicrous to people who don’t like to tidy I’m sure), but cleaning doesn’t elicit those same feelings so I’m less inclined to do it. Last night I saw the sun hitting an end table and the dust was a bit horrific. So I dusted the end table that you could see bathed in sunlight…and didn’t clean the other one on the opposite end of the couch because you couldn’t see the dust, though surely it was there in the same proportions…which is slightly embarrassing!
Birchie
I function better in a tidy environment, and pragmatically speaking, cleaning is a lot easier if you maintain it.
And then I got married…to cut a long story short it is not nearly as much fun or as efficient to “clean as I go” after the three people that I live with who function just fine in a messy environment. I’m playing the long game and have lowered my standards for now and will raise them again once we have an empty nest. My goal when I look back at my life isn’t to say “and my house was always spotless”.
Even when I was single and living in a small house, I always skimped on deep cleaning details like dusting floorboards and never have I ever washed a window. This winter when we were “between dogs” I had a plan to deep clean the house in sections, which I happily abandoned once we got the puppy…actually if I’m being honest, I abandoned the plan before we got the puppy but let’s just say it was because of the puppy. Once we got her there was a phase where our back room was perpetually covered in dust which was from her tracking mud inside every time that she went out. The wet season finally ended and now we have a less dusty room and a potty trained, happy dog so the mess was well worth it.
I *usually* wash my hands before cooking but not necessarily before eating. But I do have hand washing brag! My oldest stepson was always very contrarian about hand washing. He started working at Chipotle a few months ago, and on Sunday we had burritos for dinner and I asked him to show us how they fold the tortillas at work. He was already eating, so the ask was for him to put down his food and walk to the kitchen counter to fold the burrito. He got up, went to the sink and WASHED HIS HANDS, rolled up the burrito, and then went right back to eating. Hubs and I were stunned that he washed his hands without batting an eye. The kiddo was just like “well I’m not going to touch your food if I haven’t washed my hands” like his 19 year career of being anti-hand washing had never happened. A fast food job has done what his parents could not!
Elisabeth
I loved everything about this comment Birchie.
I clearly need a dog as a scapegoat for lack of cleaning, but for now it’s the kids. They really do not seem to see messes or dirt at all. Sigh. I was the same way, so maybe they’ll change like your stepson with his hand washing (what a hilarious AND heart-warming story).
I agree that it could be easy to spend so much time focussed on the state of our houses we don’t get out and have fun. I’m 100% in your corner on that one. I think one reason our house generally looks reasonably tidy is because we don’t have a lot of excess stuff and you’re sooo right that it’s easier to clean when you regularly maintain. Maybe my biggest hint is to make sure everything has a place, though. Even if our house looks like a tornado roared through, in 20 minutes or so we can have things looking pretty good because basically every single item in our home has a designated place to go.
Ally Bean
I’m clean, but not necessarily neat. A little mess inspires me but germs are out to get me so I keep them at bay.
Elisabeth
I’m the opposite! Mess stifles my ability to be creative or work efficiently and germs – unless very obvious – rarely cross my mind!
Michelle G.
I’d say I’m a neat and tidy person. It makes me feel calm to have everything put away. I love cupboards, drawers, and closets where I can hide any messes! My art desk is perfect because it closes up, but inside, it’s a mess! I would say that I’m reasonably clean. I’m big on washing my hands at home and using sanitizer when I’m out and about. I may be a slight germophobe about my hands, especially after Covid. But I don’t have a cleaning routine. If something looks dirty, I clean it. I vacuum pretty much every day!
Elisabeth
I tend to follow your lead – when something looks dirty, I clean it! Or if I know someone is coming over I generally make sure to do some bathroom cleaning.
I agree on the calmness – having things in their place really frees up my mind to focus on other things. I find messes distracting and am very envious of people that can ignore clutter and work productively in the middle of having things out of place. I think it’s a superpower!!!
NGS
I’m naturally neither, but I try to keep the house at “wouldn’t be embarrassed if someone stopped by to drop something off” clean. We have two four-legged creatures, so it’s never going to be magazine spread worthy, but everything has a place where it belongs and that’s really crucial. If there isn’t a place for something, it shouldn’t come into the house! I come from a family of (literal) hoarders and it has taken me a long time to really figure out how one in, one out works.
However, because of my husband’s enthusiasm for control over food (do you like how I didn’t just call him a control freak?), we do have very rigid rules about food preparation and consumption that tips over into incredibly clean. And we wash our hands approximately eight million times a day. It is what it is, I guess. I wish my husband would be less controlling about food and he wishes I didn’t have eight gazillion markers, but marriage is all about compromise.
Elisabeth
You handled Dr BBs food preferences beautifully. Good stars!
I am with you 100% on everything having a place. Not only does it keep clutter in check, it also makes it a lot less mentally taxing to clean up. Tidying is just a matter of putting things back where they belong not jumping through mental hoops trying to determine where an item should go. I think this is the number one key to being able to keep things relatively tidy (and it helps expedite finding items to – look where they should be since they have a home!!)
Elisabeth
Oh, and I want more info on the markers!! I didn’t realize you had an excess of markers. Have you discussed this before? I feel left out of a very interesting conversation. I want pictures of these markers! Why so many? What do you use them for?
Suzanne
Can I be both but also neither??? I am a huge germaphobe, but selectively. I love everything to be tidy and uncluttered, but I am a pile maker. And while I scrub down my kitchen religiously, I can’t remember the last time I did any actual dusting. Also, I wash my hands eight gazillion times a day — when I come into the house after being anywhere, after I rinse dishes, after I throw out trash, before and after I prepare food — but I don’t automatically wash hands before I sit down to a meal? Super weird and nonsensical, I know.
Elisabeth
You sure can be both and neither! Our behaviours don’t always have to make “logical” sense.
I’m impressed by your handwashing frequency!
Who would want to dust? It’s the worst!
Joy
I love your confession! I always asked my kids to wash their hands before dinner but didn’t inspect them or anything so likely they didn’t do the best job. I rarely dust baseboards. I tend to follow my mother’s motto: clean enough to be healthy; dirty enough to be happy. She almost always wanted to spend her time on one of her many interests or with us. I’m similar. I like to be tidy enough to find things (although I often have piles here and there, especially books!) and basic cleanliness. But I don’t sweat it too much.
Elisabeth
Joy this is perfect!! “Clea enough to be healthy; dirty enough to be happy.” What a wonderful motto.
I’d say I fall into the basic cleanliness category as well!
Gigi
Can I say both? But I live with a slob…so there are always messes and piles around it seems. So I make things tidy where I can and clean when I have the motivation.
Elisabeth
I’m the same – I clean when I feel like it so the time between bursts of true cleaning can vary dramatically!
I am fortunate my husband is quite neat, though we have different opinions of neatness and I would say we prioritize neatness in different areas of the house/life. But for the most part, we’re on the same (or similar) pages which is a big help!
Lisa’s Yarns
I would say I am neat. I don’t clean as Phil takes that on since he doesn’t want to hire cleaners. I like things tidy but they are far less tidy since we have young kids and it feels like a fools errand to keep the house neat/tidy all the time. I love to organize, though, but I need to have the motivation and that comes in streaks.
Elisabeth
I’ve learned it doesn’t make sense to clean up early in the day because it just keeps getting undone. The most efficient thing is to clean just after supper, but sometimes I just don’t have the energy. I have gotten more and more okay with leaving the kitchen in disarray in the evening if I have to. It really changes things now that the kids have extracurriculars AFTER supper instead of before.
coco
I’m neither. I prefer a clutter free and clean home but only if someone else is in charge. i don’t mind tidying up things, but I don’t like to clean the bathroom or floor. I have a joke with friends, that if we ever move back to the US without domestic help, we will risk breaking up our marriage. 🙂
Elisabeth
I don’t enjoy cleaning either. Though I don’t know if I’d want someone else to tidy for me? I really enjoy it most of the time and like knowing exactly where I’ve put things.
Stephany
ELISABETH I FEEL SO SEEN. I am also not someone who washes my hands before eating, and ALL of my friends do and I feel like such a dirty germy person when I forget to do so. (Not that they have ever said anything; this is all in my head!) It’s just not something we did growing up so it’s not an ingrained habit in me.
I love to tidy but I do not love to clean. My tub has to get to a seriously disgusting condition for me to finally scrub it, which isn’t great. I do really value clean floors, though, so I try to run the vacuum at least weekly if not twice a week!
Elisabeth
I’m relieved I’m not the only one who doesn’t faithfully wash hands before a meal. We have friends that always wash their hands before every single meal and I always feel self conscious when they come to visit and excuse themselves to wash their hands while I’m sitting at the table waiting to eat with my “dirty” hands!
I hate cleaning my bathtub. Ugh. It’s the worst. I agree about floors. It bothers me when they’re dirty and they get dirty so easily with two kids still at home. At least with the tub I can just pull the shower curtain.
San
I am not a germophobe either and think that a little bit of dirt hasn’t harmed anyone (in fact, I believe in your theory that being overly clean can have undesired side effects). I have gotten into the habit of washing my hands more frequently (after Covid) and I definitely wash them before cooking or when I get home but I don’t necessarily wash them before each meal.
I also fall in the neat but not overly clean camp, like you! 🙂
I once lived with a health inspector as a roommate for a while and she was terrible. She kept telling me “where not to eat” and she was very particular about cleaning in the apartment. It was a bit much, tbh.