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Let's revive sensuous housekeeping


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We devour books like The Magical Art of Tidying Up  because they teach us how to groom our homes and keep them free from clutter. Yet we want much more than a spanking clean closet and a living room that's easy on the eyes. We hunger for a rich and sensuous rapport—an ongoing love affair with home that makes us want to hunker down and never leave it. My goal is to help you discover the Eros of the house. The sweet comfort of your belongings. The joy of creating a warm and welcoming space.  The whimsy of dancing with a broom or mop.  
     
Over the years, I've lived in a variety of homes, from a Manhattan apartment to a white-washed bungalow on a Greek island, from a colonial farmhouse in the Hudson Valley to a magical cottage in the California redwoods.  I’ve learned how to put a home together quickly, unpacking the kitchen and putting pictures on the walls within two days.  Not to satisfy some crazy notion of perfection but because home is as essential to me as life and breath.  Think back to the  homemaking rituals of your grandmother's era.   The white sheets flapping in the wind, a well-dressed table, the gleam of the tile floors, the golden fruit from the orchard in well-stacked Mason jars.  A time when the words earth, hearth, and heart were as one.  This what so many of us, with our crowded lives and cramped schedules, have forgotten:  If we care for the house faithfully, in return it cares for us.  

 Don't worry. I’m not suggesting we turn back the clock. No need to beat the rugs, scour the oven with steel wool, or do the laundry by hand.  But we can be more mindful of how we approach the home.  And make tending it a wonderfully sensuous, even spiritual, practice. 

I'm here to tell you that grace and beauty can be found while polishing the furniture, washing the windows, and tidying the living room. And to suggest something really radical:  that we view housekeeping not as a dreaded chore but a form of lyric poetry.  If you mop a floor until it glistens like the surface of a lake, or oil a wooden table, working the amber liquid into the grain in slow deliberate strokes, you’ll see exactly what I mean.

 The writer Rainer Maria Rilke enjoyed donning his maid’s suede gloves and dusting the furniture in the wee hours of the morning. Touching all the swirls and crevices on a hand carved table was, he felt, an extraordinary act of intimacy.  Like caressing the body of a lover. “After this,” he said, “there’s nothing that you do not know!” 

 Yes, housekeeping can be a source of revelation. An initiation into the secret lives of your possessions.  And that's only the beginning.

This blog will appeal to those who enjoy caring for the home and want to deepen this relationship. But I'm hoping that I'll make some converts, too. Stay tuned to find out how home contributes to our sense of self, our creativity, and our close relationships--and why we ought to pay it more attention.



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Illustrations by Ann Arnold.


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