
Every year, I feel an urge to do some spring cleaning, and thereby officially heralding the arrival of a favorite season. This year, being cooped up and working at our kitchen island for days now really brought out the spring cleaning spirit, in steroids.
I’m not sure if it was feeling guilty about watching a lot of TV during this shut-in period and wanting to compensate by doing something that made me roll up my sleeves, or the fact that I’ve been using the kitchen as my ersatz office so much that it really did need a good cleaning, or perhaps a sense that, with all of the hand-washing and sanitizing going on in the battle against the coronavirus, a good kitchen cleaning might aid the cause, just a bit. Whatever the reason, I tackled the task of cleaning the kitchen with gusto: scrubbing the sink, the cabinets, the countertops, the stovetop, the oven, and the refrigerator, wiping down our appliances, sweeping the floor, and getting the windows, too. I tried to clean every crack and crevice, and even emptied and wiped down the crumb tray in the toaster.
When I finished I felt good about my efforts, as I always do when I do a household chore. The kitchen looked clean — for now, at least — and I could almost feel Mom’s spirit hovering in the air, nodding approvingly.
The smell of ammonia in the air — sniff! — smells like victory.