Showering one's shower is really damn hard! Once you get in and spray the walls, the walls spit back at you because you are too close, the fold-in shower doors jab you in the back and wipe their sticky panes all over you, just when you think everything is clean you look at the shower floor and it is dirty from your ever-wet ever-dirty feet, when you try to hose the cleaning agent off the walls with the shower head itself it sprays everywhere including your into your own face like a mad thing...there must be an easier way to clean a shower...that's all I'm saying.
Cleaning the toilet and bidet (yes, there are bidets in every room, and yes, I still find them mystifying) is much easier. The sink, simply a breeze. But the shower...
That said I am finding this cleaning bizarrely relaxing. The realisation that there is a part of my dark, slobby, soul that actually loves cleaning occurred in Italy when washing socks in hotel basins became an almost nightly occurence. Something about the mindless productivity of it, the heat of the water melting away the dirt....it was satisfying. And yet at home I wouldn't touch the laundry unless under the pain of death. I am in fact hoping to keep this secret from my parents for as long as possible lest they take advantage of this newfound love of mine and put it to good use. That would take away the fun!
I am far though from being a domestic goddess. I remember reading an article about Nigella Lawson (who as far as I am concered is the Goddess of all Goddesses and the closest thing to a modern day Mary Poppins our generation could ever know) and how she went to Italy as a teen, discovering there her love for Italy, for its beauty, its food and for domestic related things. I am not quite at that stage yet, although scrubbing my toilet in my beautiful little bathroom in this stunning 18th century house is kinda heading in the right direction I hope.
I usually set the table for my family here and Italians I find are quite particular about how they like their tables set. At home in Australia my family always has dinner together, and yes the table setting follows a particular pattern. But usually if someone wants something to drink they just go to the kitchen and grab one themselves. Or, if they want tomato source same deal. Here though certain plates, decorated in that typically gorgeous Tuscan style, are settled on particular wicker placemats, cups are placed on the table for everyone with the assumption everyone will drink and only ever are forks used. Breakfast is more particular where instead of bowls being placed on the table for cereal large mugs are used, also Tuscan in style, with little matching plates. It is like eating your cereal out of a teacup and I am a massive fan. It is very cute too, because on alternating days depending on the dishwashing load the four boys have brightly coloured round mugs emblazoned with the characters from the popular Italian kids show here called Barbapapa Really cute. These do not have matching plates so we put them on clear glass ones.
After dinner I also help cleaning up, although sometimes the parents insist I relax and let the boys take turns cleaning up, loading the dishwasher. After playing with the boys I also tend to clean up afterwards and depending on the violence of the game (on a scale of playing 'let's run around the house and catch the au pair' to playing with plasticine, paint and textas simultaneously) the effort required for this duty can vary. It is never a burden though.
It does make me wonder though why I enjoy it so much. The first thought that came to mind was that I love taking care of people. But does that mean if I let my room disintegrate to the state of broken lingerie factory that I don't love taking care of myself? Maybe, in some ways taking care of oneself can be harder...maybe I find this because more often then not I live a lifestyle which doesn't allow me the time to relax into this duty, develop some discipline even to enjoy it. I know some people who love cleaning their room, re-organising it etc. After a night out, getting home at midnight or later, I do the bear minimum: brush my teeth, strip, fling the clothes to the floor and sleep, tricking myself into believing I will put those things away tomorrow...oh yeah, that dirty pile is kind of becoming the dirty field of doom....Next morning however I wake up late for an appointment, I throw myself out of bed, shower, throw open the closet, snatch whatever will not make me look like the freaky Junk Lady from The Labyrinth (which funnily enough I was dispapointed but not surprised to get as a result of the recent Buzzfeed quiz 'Which Labyrinth Character are you?') and head out the door as my dirty abandoned clothes hiss and scream my name, forever waiting for recognition of the state of neglect I leave them in.
I am just not good at it. I am not an OCD person, not at all when it comes to myself. I am a hygienic person though. I always wash my hands, I shower every day and I enjoy the feel of clean hair, nails and clothes..I just hate the processes I have to go through to get those privileges.
And yet here I am in Italy....scrubbing toilets and bidets with a silly smile on my face. Maybe I really am in love with Italy, and will just do anything for it, even things that go against my own Junk Lady nature.
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