Housework

Housework. The list of stigmas is almost endless: tedious chores, time suck, outdated drudgery, mother’s expectations. But why the visceral reaction? Of the host of reasons, I usually blame generational issues, cultural connotations, and guilty feelings. I also follow the reasoning of Cheryl Mendelson whose excellent book Home Comforts, I recently picked up (thanks, Tami!). She writes of the lost art and science of keeping house. Wendell Berry would agree with its decline. As we’ve hired help and bought appliances to do the work, we’ve taken the skill and the inherent dignity out of housework. It makes sense; as the work became simple it became boring, less satisfying, and eventually contemptible.

So housework is a drag but I love being home. And I love visiting friends whose homes are comfortable and welcoming. The home can be a small, living society that meets the intimate needs of family and friends. Berry describes home as a place where husband and wife understand that they belong to one another and need each other for something real and satisfying. It’s a creative place, with its own economy of housekeeping, carpentry, gardening, and a cottage industry of sorts. These are labors of love, rewarding for you and those closest to you.

As Mendelson points out, housekeeping is an art and a science. As an art, it requires intuition and physical skill to create comfort, beauty, and order. As a science, it uses a body of knowledge that keeps us clean and healthy. She writes, “The art of taking care of our homes brings comfort and consolation both in the enjoyment of the fruits of our labor and in the increasingly rare freedom to engage in worthwhile, unalienated, honorable work.” What a respectable use of our time.

Enjoy the home comforts and the restorative powers of a home, it’s beauty, familiarity, and rest.