Only The Curious

I had nothing on my schedule today. NOTHING. No work, no events, no hanging out with friends. I don’t even have things in mind that I might do. Tuesday, August 17th, 2010 was a blank slate for me. I think it’s the emptiest day I’ve had since… the last summer vacation I had when I didn’t have a job. So like, 8th grade.

It’s weird. Usually I would try to fill a day like this. Seeing my empty calendar would normally inspire one of two feelings in me: panic at the nothingness and lack of people-interaction, or a manic-like need to get as much done as humanly possible in my empty time. Or, at least, I would normally try to take advantage – go on a big hike, go to the museum, do things I wouldn’t normally do during the week because I don’t have time.

But I didn’t. I spent 5 hours meticulously cleaning the house this morning, and now I’ve been writing and doing internet-y things all afternoon. I’m probably going to go work out after I finish this post. Then I might make dinner. Exciting stuff.

Part of me feels like I totally wasted a good day. A good SUMMER day at that. I feel guilty. Like it’s a bad thing that I didn’t go lie in the sun and read, or go see something new, or get a ton of freelance work done. I think because I have so often used housework as procrastination that when I get down to just doing some chores that need doing I still feel like I’m using that as an excuse for not working.

Maybe I am. But, then, I find a cluttered house really distracting. I struggle to sit down and focus when everything around me as a mess. Dealing with that doesn’t count as procrastination, does it? What about if it takes up half of a beautiful day?

I should add here that housecleaning, like exercising, is no quick task for me. It’s one of the few realms where my perfectionist tendencies are still allowed free reign. In the process of folding my clothes and putting them away, I’ll go through my closet and organize my clothes by type and then color. And then I’ll make sure all of my shirts are facing the same way. This morning I scrubbed the coffee grounds out of the grout in the kitchen, and reorganized the cabinets for maximum efficiency. Poor Karl won’t be able to find his cereal tomorrow. Oh, I re-arranged the contents of the freezer, too, so that all of the meat is in one part, the pizzas and breads in another, and frozen veggies in a third. They each have their own place. And now there’s more room in there. And nothing falls out when you open it.

Okay, so maybe I’m a little neurotic about keeping my environment tidy. I would love it if my house were always perfectly clean and organized, so I could always find things, entertain at the drop of a hat, and never feel like I need to spend an entire day cleaning instead of doing things that earn me money. Or are fun.

But being that level of tidy isn’t really in my nature. So I let it go until it stresses me out. Then I have a freakout day and go nuts getting it all cleaned again. Rinse, repeat.

According to the MBTI, we flip to the opposite of our preference when we get stressed out. So I guess, being an ENFP, that it makes sense. The P part of me is too busy having fun and winging it to worry about cleaning. But then it stresses me out and I flip to uber J and you find me bleaching the kitchen counters or scrubbing things with a toothbrush at 2am.

Speaking of, I’m pretty sure the putty is dry enough for me to go sand down the walls in the bathroom…

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