A Generation of Non-Cleaners

If you stain your couch, what do you do? Do you pat it firmly with white vinegar, or use a formula of baking soda and seltzer and salt and a scrub brush? Or do you leave it, bothered, and eventually replace the couch? Most people don't expect you do darn your socks or repair your stockings, but what about the rest of your things?

I think one of the great contributors to the consumerism of our times is simply that we have never learned to clean, and we are generally taught that it takes too long, anyway.

This bears quite a bit on understanding the mentality of many of my clients, who are of the Depression generation, or raised by those who were. Out of necessity everything was salvageable, and even if you personally didn't know how to fix it, You might need it someday so you'd find someone who could.

It is probably not possible to teach everyone to clean, because time is such a commodity these days. Cleaning and reusing our stuff would save our landfills, our space, and our money. But, in the meantime, let's at least pass the stuff on to those who can enjoy it (and might be able to repair/clean it).

More on this topic soon.

Let's reuse, and here's to cleaning!