My car is wonderfully clean inside. It got me to thinking about our passion for cleanliness and neatness. Have we always had this orientation? I assume that we've always had some orientation to hygiene, but we know that's not the case.
What about neatness? There has been a growing trend in the last 10 years about tidying up, reducing clutter, and living a simpler life. There's a magazine for this: Real Simple. Perhaps the trend is growing because of our messy internet. I can appreciate this after yesterday's look through the chaos of meme websites - cluttered visually, verbally explosive and hectically flashing things.
Tidiness is now associated with 'calm respite' with symmetry and order. This has turned into a personal practice, described by Sarah Hampton as "knolling". That's the term some artists use to describe the ritual of organizing and arranging their tools in specific order and configurations, like a surgeon's instruments in an operating room, before they start their work. Some of the inspiration for the blog Things Organized Neatly came from this practice.
If we want to analyze neatness at a broad historical level there isNeatness: Webster's Timeline History, 1535 - 2005 Paperback – Aug. 17 2010 is a most interesting book - it is one of its bibliographic and event-based timeliness - comprehensive in scope, covering virtually all topics, geographic locations and people. They do so from a linguistic point of view, and in the case of this book, the focus is on "Neatness," including when used in literature (e.g. all authors that might have Neatness in their name). As such, this book represents the largest compilation of timeline events associated with Neatness when it is used in proper noun form.
I found this joke that is really long, perhaps that is what makes it seem so funny.
A man wants a pet A man wants a pet. So he visits his local pet shop and inquires .
Man: “I want an obedient pet. One that would do anything I ask of it no matter what”. The store clerk: “I know exactly what you need”. The clerk steps out back for a few minutes and returns with a tiny box containing a centipede. Man: “A centipede, really?” Clerk: “Yes, trust me” Man: “Sold!”
The man takes his new pet back home and immediately starts giving orders. Man: “I am going to go cook in the kitchen. I would like you to clean this entire living room. Make it spic and span.”
After the man finished cooking and eating, he returns to his living in the most well-kept state it has ever been. Dusting, organizing, and everything in between was taken care of. He is amazed.
Man: “Okay, that was really cool. Now I want you to do the same for the kitchen”
After relaxing on the couch, he checks on the kitchen to find it in a perfect state of cleanliness as well. He just couldn’t believe how amazing this centipede was.
One Sunday morning, he tasks the centipede to go out and get the newspaper. The centipede steps outside to fetch it.
10 minutes go by... 30 minutes... 1 hour...
Impatient and confused, the man steps outside to see the centipede still at the front of the door with no newspaper
Man: “Where’s my newspaper?! It’s been an hour!!” Centipede: “I AM STILL PUTTING MY SHOES ON!!!”
Here's the view from the Beamer Park on the escarpment. This is from a few years ago. We're looking to the east, so the distant ridge is likely Port Dalhousie.
