Cleaning Detente

I’m not much of a housekeeper, but I like my home to be clean. This oxymoron has led to countless struggles and numerous scuffles with my significant other. We would, to this day, still be arguing over who does more around the house—but we have devised a solution that works for us.

My husband and I have found that the only way to avoid bickering about whose turn it is to vacuum or take out the garbage (a classic minefield!) is to set a mutually convenient time once a week to clean. On that day, we make a list of the chores, then clean like fools.

This way, we divide and conquer all of the tasks and no one feels like he was doing more than the other. Plus, there are invariably some chores that one person loathes, but the other person isn’t bothered by doing. Or there are certain chores that one person simply does better. For instance, while I get a strange sense of accomplishment from dusting, I can’t stand cleaning the bathroom. But because my husband is super-meticulous, he does a fantastic job on it.

The point is that we work together to get our place in order as fast as possible, and to divide chores based on personal preference or our individual strengths (and weaknesses)—not according to dated definitions of “women’s” or “men’s” tasks.

Once we are ready to begin cleaning, we put on an upbeat CD to get us going (it’s crazy, but for us that means Shania Twain…seriously…her really old album with the single, “Man, I feel like a woman” on it! Hey! Stop judging! I didn’t say it had to be good music! Whatever works, right?) and clean until the CD ends. It’s typically about an hour of hard-core, down ’n’ dirty cleaning.

After that, we can relax for the rest of the week, knowing that we’ve given our place one good scrub. We still do little things to keep our place tidied up during the week, but we don’t worry about serious cleaning again until our dedicated cleaning date and time.