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The Messy Art of Living Alone
by Camerin Courtney
January 23, 2008
I'm dying to show someone my bedroom closet. It's a well-organized thing of beauty.
At least, for right now.
During my recent two days home sick from work—battling a bone-rattling cough and hiding out from Chicagoland's negative-14-degree weather—I got the sudden urge to purge the clutter from my bedroom closet and kitchen cabinets.
I have to be in the right frame of mind to sort with true effectiveness. That frame of mind is somewhere between Army drill sergeant and Peace Corps volunteer. I need to be ruthless, fighting the temptation to hang onto that gaudy blouse because I once received a compliment while wearing it. And I need to be benevolent, thinking of all the needy people who could drink from the 57 mugs I've somehow collected over the years.
However, this mindset strikes me with the frequency of a lunar eclipse. So when the urge hits, I need to just go with it—copious amounts of phlegm or not.
I used to experience this mindset more frequently when I had a roommate. Actually, I think the mindset was less of a motivator than was my pride—either saving my pride in not wanting my roommate to see me as messy, or boosting my pride in having her oooh and ahhh over my work.
So the other day when I stepped back to admire my closet-cleaning handiwork, I wanted to turn to someone and say, "Am I impressive, or what?" But then, to truly appreciate my achievement, my companion would have needed to see the "before," with shoes and purses obscuring the floor and an extra 87 hangers clogging up the works. I'd gathered up four trash bags of clothes, shoes, and purses to give away. And then I'd moved on to the kitchen and gathered another two bags of mugs and Tupperware containers. (I'm convinced some of these objects mate and multiply when I'm not looking.)
My strange need for a witness reminded me of that old philosophical question asking whether a tree falling in a forest really makes a sound if no one's around to hear it. Suddenly I found myself wondering, If a single person cleans out a closet and no one's around to woohoo it, does the accomplishment really count?
Instead of an adoring audience, I was alone, clapping over my cleanliness . . . and vowing not to shop again for months.
But I've grown accustomed to this need for self-motivation and self-congratulations. As anyone who's lived alone can attest, one of the best things about a solo home is that no one else is around to see the mess. And, ironically, one of the worst things about solo living is that no one else is around to see the mess.
I love that in the middle of a busy week—filled with church commitments, freelance work projects, and coffee dates with friends—I can waltz in and out of my home as if I were at a hotel. By the end of those weeks, an archaeologist could do a dig on my bedroom chair to discover what I wore all week, could spot the various places I opened my mail and started organizing it into "pay now" and "deal with later" piles, and could likely see a growing stack of need-to-be washed dishes in my sink.
I love that I can order my life around my priorities—serving others, cultivating community, nurturing my faith—instead of get bogged down with housekeeping. And I especially appreciate that my increasing lack of domestic attention during the week's progression doesn't affect anyone else.
But the other day when I heard myself tell someone not to judge my domestic skills by the state of my kitchen—which sported a fair amount of dust and a sparse amount of food—I began to wonder why I need someone else's eyes looking in before I see the mess. And why I don't feel as great a need to clean and sort and stock and wash for me?
Perhaps I don't perform household tasks as much for myself because, as a woman, I've often heard the admonition to perform domestic chores in order to serve others—offering a tidy home to a weary spouse, cooking nutritious meals for young, growing bodies. But without these people in my life, without this external motivation for tackling certain tasks, I need to tap into a different, internal motivation for keeping my home.
A divorced friend gave voice to this different motivation recently when she talked about the strangeness of setting up a home and cooking and cleaning for herself. She noticed these activities required a different energy from the motivation she'd had throughout her marriage. "It felt freeing and yet almost selfish to do these things just for me," she confided.
Those final three words—just for me—helped me put part of this struggle in perspective. I've set up a home just for me. I've decorated it just for me. I prepare meals there just for me. I clean it just for me. Sure, I strive to practice good hospitality in my home, so, on the days I'm expecting guests, I do these tasks with others in mind as well. But most days, I'm the only one who notices whether I do these things or not; I'm the only one who benefits or suffers from the investment of time and energy or not.
I admit I'm tempted at times to see my housekeeping as selfish. To think I'm going through a lot of effort for little ol' me. Other times I'm tempted not to do these tasks, since I'm the only one who'll notice, and I don't really mind a few piles in my bedroom, a half-decorated kitchen, eggs for dinner again.
But, in the end, I don't want to live in a hotel—a place where I flit and alight, coming and going without a sense of ownership and rootedness. I want to live in a home. And, right now, I'm a household of one. So I get to (or, perhaps, have to) determine what sort of home I want to keep—whether it will be messy or organized, will sport vintage or modern décor, will feature gourmet meals or quick-and-easy fare. I need to make these decisions intentionally—and just for me.
While keeping a home for others requires a servant's heart, compromise, and selflessness, keeping a home for oneself requires discipline, responsibility, and a certain amount of self-esteem. For I know I'm one of God's beloved kids who deserve a safe haven for body, heart, mind, and soul.
So, I'm going to excuse myself now, because I have a nice clean closet I need to go admire.
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