You might think I’m going to tell you the perfect book to listen to while cleaning your house is Marie Kondo’s .
Mmm, not so much!
I mean, I love that book — it did change my life. Or at least I’m pleased every time I open my dresser and glimpse my shirts stacked in tight little rolls, like they’re cigars just shipped back from Cuba. But I am not a person who approaches a cleaning weekend with a sunshiney disposition and tons of energy. I have to be coerced and then distracted the entire time so I don’t realize I’m wasting precious hours of my life sorting mail and tossing UFOs (Unidentified Freezer Objects).
That’s why, when I tackled a long weekend of spring cleaning, I queued up , a popular psychological thriller that I heard had a killer twist ending.
“This is our fresh start,” said a wife about her husband. “Our new beginning.” Sure, she was talking about resuming their lives after doing something horrific, but I couldn’t help but apply these maxims to my own life. I mean, if they could clean up carnage, surely I could take my recycling to the curb?
Then, a dark turn. “I sometimes wonder if he wants to kill me and be done with it all. Get rid of the albatross around his neck.” Finally. Someone put into words how I felt about those untouched cookbooks in my kitchen. They were my albatrosses, and so I gently removed them from my apartment and placed them on the sidewalk, where some unsuspecting — or grateful — passerby might scoop them up.
Curious if my thriller success was just a fluke, I put on , which is being called the Gone Girl of Australian crime fiction. (Reese Witherspoon’s production company optioned film rights.) But its brilliantly knotted plot and whiplash turns made me put down the toilet brush and pay attention. Fine … time to take a break, anyway.
The next day I was ready to accept that I was cleaning, so I tried something more directly related: . “Simplicity offers the solution to so many problems,” said the narrator in a soothing tone that made me instantly want to give up everything I’d ever owned and live only with a single toothbrush. The author, who took up a minimalistic way of life after decades of living in Japan, writes that “Simplicity means possessing little, clearing the way for the bare necessities, the quintessence of things. Simplicity is beautiful because it brings hidden joys.” And then the kicker: “The less we have, the greater our sense of freedom.”
I wanted freedom! I wanted simplicity!
Cut to two hours and four bulging trash bags later. Oh, it was on.
Since France had the simplicity message down, I hopped to nearby Denmark for . Immediately, one major cobweb was cleared: I finally knew how to pronounce “hygge” (it’s hoo-gah). Okay, so hygge promotes the virtues of living comfy and taking breaks and wearing fuzzy socks, which doesn’t exactly jibe with a tornado cleaning spree. But then author and narrator Meik Wiking, who is also CEO of the Happiness Research Institute in Copenhagen, said that “hygge is an atmosphere or experience, rather than being about things.” That was welcome news, since I was determined to throw out 99% of my things.
