How to never need to clean up your room.

First of all

DO THINGS RIGHT AWAY

It usually only takes a minute or two so... Don't put it off. If you do whatever it is just when it happens you will never need to go back and do it when you are busy doing something else.

These 2 rules pretty much sum it up:

1. Don't put it down, Put it away.

2. If it drops, Pick it up.

Rule # 1 Don't put it down, Put it away.

Cloths

As the dryer finishes fold the laundry

It will only take a few minutes each time the dryer stops and the cloths will not get wrinkled and pile up in a dozen baskets to be folded as you watch the 2 hour movie it takes to get it all folded. Taking that few minutes to put them away keeps it from being the daunting task at the end of an endless laundry cycle.

You will always have laundry, always! So, make it easy on yourself and do it a little at a time.

Take it off and...

put it in the laundry

this keeps the floor uncluttered and your room smelling good. The laundry room, well, that is another story.

put it folded in a drawer or on a shelf

Clean folded laundry will look nice when you come to ware it instead of all wrinkled up and messy. Don't put dirty cloths in there!

put it on a hanger or hook

Larger items like coats and jackets can pile up really fast because they are big, but if you hang them up they seem to disappear as well as dry if it has been raining. You will also know where they are--a bonus.

You will never hear "Go in there and clean up that mess!" because there never will be one!

Oh! Change your bed once a week. Put your sheets in the laundry. You sweat during the day and if you go more than a week without changing your bed your room smells like sweat and dirty socks. Yuck!

Dishes

Wash them as you finish using them. You would be surprised what a little water and a soapy sponge can do for your kitchen. If you don't put things in the sink, rinse them out then put them in the dishwasher it is so easy once a day to start it up and all you need to do is put them away. How simple is that!

Every day big meals will be cooked or a project will be made which sometimes means bigger a clean up job. But, if you rinse out things as you finish using them and put them in the dishwasher the cleanup will be almost done. Plus you will not have cross-contamination, germs, bacteria and other yucky stuff all over the nice food you just cooked. This will keep colds and flu from going from one person to the next too! How cool is that.

Rule #2 If it drops...

Pick it up

So many times we miss the trash, let a paper, a toy or just something dirty drop then just ignore it. Just pick it up and put it where it goes. You will never need to touch it again. (this is particularly nice when it is something really yucky.) No worries, guilt or someone yelling at you because you dropped your bike in back of the car and it is now SMASHED!

Wipe it up!

Spills are particularly dangerous. Wet stuff can cause slips and falls not to mention damage of the surface it falls on. Stains and mildew look and smell really bad. No one needs their house to look and smell like that!

Vacuum it up!

Sugar, flour, and other dry stuff can be slippery too. So just get out a broom, vacuum cleaner or mop and clear it up. It only takes a few minutes when it is all in one place, but wait an hour or two and the flour is all over the place and the whole house needs to be vacuumed!

If you learn these few rules you will only need to vacuum and dust once in a while because no matter how close you follow them dirt will come and it will need to be cleaned. But, you will never need to spend the whole day cleaning again!

Yesterday I found out why I do what I do

I have a friend who has taken years to get close to. She has been alone for years and finally had made a cognitive leap into her imagination to create a reality that is really different from any of the rest of us. She was unable to be touched. She took offence at the smallest things. She was combative. She was plain rude at times totally rejecting any sign that she was cared about. As I endured she began to soften.

It has taken years for her to expose her reality to me. As I validated her perspective, yet stayed separate from this construction, she became more and more friendly first finding ways to "take care of me" then just plain affectionate responses still not wanting to be touched however. One day a while ago she spontaneously hugged me. A surprise for sure, but a welcomed change in her.

Yesterday I saw her opening her perspective to a gift I made her. The look on her face of gratitude and genuine love was delightful and the best Christmas gift I could have gotten. Bless her heart--some hope has entered her world.

I have no intention of intruding on her, but because I endured her negative behavior, took her prospective seriously, accepted her ideas, trying to understand where she had developed the construct of her life and genuinely wanted to care about her anyway, She opened her heart to being loved. I am grateful that I did not give up.

It may seem at times, even to me, that who I am is a mistake, that what I think is so far out of step with what the world is doing now that I must be wrong, but yesterday I found out why I do what I do just by the look on her face.

Wow! Merry Christmas

Note from beyond from Ruthie

My mother passed away almost 7 years ago. Today I was cleaning out the garage and found yet another note from my mom.

Who's Name? Mine?
By Ruthie written February 2, 1995

Until I was 65 years old I thought I was named after my God Father's wife, Ruth Morris, my mother's matron of honor and wife of my Dad's friend and best man, Governor Morris, the writer. She was an actress of some repute. My mother told me she was very beautiful. I didn't know my mother's younger sister had claimed the name Ruth for her middle name. For years I basked in the lime light of the talented actress, now I had to adjust to "You were named after me!" from my abstinent Aunt Aldine "Ruth" Henriques Young. I am glad I didn't know this until this stage of my life.

My birth certificate reads: Ruth Underwood Brown-- the Underwood after my Grandmother Brown's family and my father's middle name. Mother used to tell me my Grandmother Brown wanted me to be named after Great Aunt Matilda, but they didn't think "Tilly" was a suitable name for their daughter, but Ruthie stuck. Those who knew me well called me Ruthie--my Aunt Aurora called me Ruthie until the day she died at 91 years young.

I was Ruth Underwood Brown until I was a little past 2 when in the baptismal font in St Patrick's Church in San Jose I became Ruth Marie Brown. I remember the glow of the stained glass window and my Aunt Aurora holding me.

Somewhere in recent years I became just Ruth. Where Ruthie was a term of endearment, Ruth gives deference to my years and status of Great Grandmother.

I have always liked my name. It is easy to spell, easy to pronounce, holds some dignity, and rhymes with Truth.

So, Ruth Underwood Brown changed to Ruth Marie Brown in 1927. My named changed again in 1944 at the Navy Chapel in Corpus Christi, Texas to Ruth Marie Brown Byles. Then Ruth Marie Brown Byles Becker has been on my driver's license since 1980.

I read a tribute my God Father wrote for his Ruth when she died and felt proud to have been named for such a person. My Aunt Aldine lived to 91 years old with Ruth as her middle name. She was determined, stubborn and fought for her way throughout her life. According to the New Dictionary of the English Language (1925) the name Ruth, of biblical derivation means Beauty. The two people who held my name were examples of strength and beauty. My wish is somehow the legacy of "this" Ruth will have been to show the beauty around us in trivial and everyday things and people.

And she did!

The Nature of Taste

This week my apricots come into full ripeness--soft, juicy, creamy smooth goodness, a real treat in my mouth. I popped the first one into my mouth and my eyes rolled back and closed in pleasure. The full sweetness and soft goodness sent my whole body into a trance.

That first bite was delightful. I picked a basket full and made some apricot syrup for the winter all the while popping one or two beauties into my mouth. I could not let all of them go into the jars. The first taste of the cooled syrup was another moment of bliss. I was in culinary heaven.

The plums were also ripe, so I made Ginger Plum Sauce and again my taste buds reeled at the first taste of the cooled suace--spicy, dark plum hit the sides of my mouth like a jolt and suprised me. What a treat on chicken wings or in BarBQ sauce, I thought to myself as I put the jars on the shelf.

Then something started to happen as I continued to eat the apricots. They seemed less flavorful , almost watery. I realized that the taste buds had been awakened to the new flavor as a test to see if it was OK to eat. As I ate more my mouth did not need this test, so it quieted down its reaction to the flavor. If I thought hard as I was eating one the flavor came through, but I no longer needed to know if it was Ok to eat. My mouth just ate it for the food value because it knew it was safe.

This is why you do not eat special foods regularly. Keeping them for special occasions renews the initial reaction to the flavor and gives you much more pleasure than to eat these foods often and get used to the flavor and then just munch it.

Salt is not like that and neither is sugar so every time you "taste" it. But the more delicate unusual the flavor the more you need to have just a little of it once in a while to recieve the same pleasure.

Isn't that like life? The more you do something the more boring it gets. Maybe the mouth is a lesson. If you are hungry then by all means munch. But, if you want to experience something fully like the first time, do it just a little onece in a while and the full experience will be yours for the taking.