Does this Sock Spark Joy in Me? and Other Tough Questions About House Cleaning

A lot of folks have been posting lately about a book called The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up. The article I read called it “a mysterious Japanese organizational manual.” The subtext here, of course, as with most self-help books is that the way you currently organize your life, by the way, is wrong.  I’m sure this is true for me—first, there’s nothing either Japanese OR mysterious about my organizational system.

Also, I learned from this article that according to Marie Kondo, the author of this inspiring tome, I am also bad at throwing things out. The way you’re supposed to do it is, find everything of one kind in your house (like every piece of clothing, for example), then put it in a giant pile, sit down and go through every single item, one at a time, and ask—does this item spark joy in me?

What?? I think it would be faster to just keep my dog and that one pair of Lucky jeans from the late nineties that I’m convinced are labeled with the wrong size—because literally nothing else sparks actual, like, joy. I mean, she’s not asking, does this item make you happy, or content—nope, the litmus test here is JOY. That's a lot to expect from a t-shirt or a spaghetti strainer or a wall sconce.

The system gets weirder, though—this Kondo person also suggests that if you do give an item away, you should first thank it for the role it’s played in your life.

What I want to know is, when did we get so chatty with our material possessions? When did it become socially acceptable to start a dialogue with our sock drawer? Kondo also suggests socks be stored flat, because they work so hard for us while they’re on our feet. I’ll bet if socks do talk, she’s their number one hero. Finally!—the socks will say. Marie Kondo is the Sock Advocate we’ve been waiting for!

It seems to me that all this personification of stuff is likely to lead to more issues, not less. I’ve seen a few of those hoarding shows, and those folks always have these mysterious (there’s that word again) relationships with their stuff. Everyone around them is screaming that they should throw away those National Geographic magazines from 1975 already. But the hoarder woman says, like-- no, I need to keep them, because my father loved lizards, and there’s a great gecko article in the July issue, or some such. 

Here's the thing. It’s just stuff. You don’t have to apologize to your castoffs before putting them in the Goodwill bag. I’m also going to make the radical claim that you don’t actually need to feel joy when looking at your kitchen utensils or your upstairs closet. When I look at probably eighty percent of what I own I think, wow, I’d really like to buy a new one of those. And that’s okay. It’s aspirational, even—right? Instead of digging through my closet looking for joy, you can probably find me shopping, which, if you ask me, is where the magic really happens.

That's When I Go to Goop

Sometimes I just feel a little bit too confident, a bit too content with all of my admittedly white-bread, middle American life choices. That’s when I go to Goop.

Goop.com is Gwenyth Paltrow’s answer to the question nobody was asking, “How can I be more of a stick goddess whose every decision is pure and healthy and filled with cosmic wonder?"

I last visited the site when writing a (quasi) review of Gwyn’s cookbook, which I’ll call I’m Better At Eating Than You. (Disclosure: I didn’t read the book, but it’s true: she is definitely much, much better at eating than me).

A brief trip to Goop offers many wonders. The main page offers a review of “clean” lip balms, which puzzles me, as I would not have thought a woman of Paltrow’s stature would have trouble finding a lip balm that hasn’t already been sampled. I have this trouble myself when trying to shop the discount bin at Ulta.

But I didn’t stop to investigate further, as my eye was drawn by the promise of learning how to make “Moon Juice.” The article begins with these enticing words: 

“Moon Juice is magic. Like, real magic.” 



Real magic? Like in Harry Potter? Count me IN! But as I continue reading I’m disappointed to learn that the “magic” apparently comes only from consuming exotic ingredients that no one’s ever heard of, like schisandra berry and mucuna (which could not have a less appetizing name).

The writer of this post then goes on to praise the magic juice maker (whose last name, ironically, is Bacon) saying that not only can she invent drinks with weird berries, “she is also other-worldly: She literally glows from within, making any encounter with her, an ‘I’ll have what she’s having’ moment.”

I now begin to understand the “real magic” mix-up from before, since the author does not know what the word literally means. I have been misled by bad grammar. Apparently even consuming only the juice of rare and incredibly expensive fruits does not ensure peak brain function. It seems even Moon Juice has its limits.  

The Snark Reflex

I had fun live tweeting the Oscars this year, along with a huge percentage of my tweeps, and all the people I follow who have never heard of me and never will. Lena Dunham, for example, was very witty, as usual. She also had a sort of hall-monitor moment which struck me as rather odd. She addressed those being snarky about Anne Hathaway as “Ladies” and urged us to save our snark for those who are are not feminists/advancing “the cause.” 

Consider those of us who were at least initially puzzled by backwards necklaces properly chastised.

There are two things happening here. First, Dunham seems to be suggesting that it’s perfectly acceptable to make snide comments about people who do not share one’s political or cultural views. This is sort of a troubling idea if you really think about it.

Second, Dunham was not the only tweeter last Sunday to break in to the general merriment to chastise the “haters” and call for a more positive commentary.

Are you kidding me?

Dear Positivity Police,

When I tweeted about the fact that Kristin Stewart might reasonably have been expected to comb her hair…to present at The Academy Awards…I wasn’t under some delusion that I was being helpful. K-Stew does not care what we think—it’s sort of her thing. Also, again, to be clear, we’re talking about the freaking Oscars, people. Not grooming=tacit permission for snark.

I guess the thing is, my thinking is that it is and should be okay for the vast majority of the world who was not invited to an opulent event for shiny, wealthy people to engage in a bit of harmless commentary. We are not talking about picking on a group of insecure eighth graders here. Does every conversation have to be positive? It seems to me that it’s all too easy to carve out a little piece of the moral high ground by tossing off a tweet telling everyone to stop the hating.

I hope none of them were being hypocritical: I hope their profiles would reveal only cheerleading and supportive emoticons.  But I also think they kind of missed the point. For myself—I was not hating. I love the Oscars. I love the beautiful dresses, but I actually kind of enjoy the weird, disaster ones even more. I like the whole schmear: the bad jokes, the terrible pre-show hosts. Doesn’t mean I don’t sometimes cry watching some random person win an Oscar for Documentary Short Film—some person I’ve never heard of and a movie I’ll never see. Because there’s something really beautiful about watching someone’s dream come true.

I’m not just one thing or the other: all snark or meanness, or all sunshine and :)’s. I say, your target’s a multi-millionaire who was recently considered pretty enough to play Snow White, go ahead and obey the snark reflex. And feel free to make fun of me for crying when that guy thanked his grandma.