Cooking and Cleaning

Cooking and Cleaning

Being a woman, I have always gotten the impression from people that, somehow, I should like to cook. Cooking, cooking, cooking, the magic job. I hate to cook. I don’t even like to toast. If someone hands me toast, I love it, but I do not toast on my own, toasting is cooking. I will use the microwave however; I make one thing daily, these sort of muffin-y things, I toss the ingredients in a blender then microwave them. That’s it for cooking. Now cleaning is another story.

Apparently, women are also supposed to do the majority of the cleaning, but they are also supposed to dislike it immensely. I like it. I like to clean. I don’t mean I like everything to be clean, I’m not really even that good at it, certainly not very fussy. I just like the work. I like to drift through the house cleaning up the things I find. Some making neat, some vacuuming, dusting, even scrubbing. Just whatever needs doing that I have the time and energy to do. I fog out into cleaning.

Nasty to say, but the quiet is a plus. When you’re cleaning people don’t bother you. I’m not sure if they’re being nice, not wanting to interrupt you, or they’re afraid you’ll try pulling them into the work. Either way it’s nice, quiet. You can think about anything because thinking about the cleaning is not required. It’s dusty or dirty, or messy. You fix that, and it’s done. It doesn’t take much thinking, so you are free to think about whatever you want, or nothing at all if you prefer. And when you’re ready for people again, you just stop, and they all wander back.

Cleaning is the real perfect activity. And by the way… no weight gain either!