Spring Cleaning

So it's almost spring. In addition to the traditional 'spring cleaning' I'm giving my apartment, it's also time for some seasonal internal cleansing.

I have two major goals: to make my apartment into a more comfortable and welcoming sanctuary for myself, and to abstain from alcohol, dairy, wheat, caffeine, refined sugar and processed foods for 14 days. We'll see which one proves more difficult.

For the past several years, I've tried to do a 14-day detoxification around the time when the seasons change. Every 4 months or so, I seem to find myself drinking every night and eating cheese and ice cream for dinner several times a week. I feel sluggish and depressed and when I start sleeping for 10 hours a night and still feel groggy in the morning, I know it's time to remind myself that fruits and vegetables are delicious, and that while baguette with olive oil is a delightful european indulgence, it doesn't count as dinner.

However, most often when the seasons change, I don't actually do a proper cleanse. I just think really hard about how I should be doing it, have lunch at Angelica's Kitchen, call myself pure and then celebrate with a bottle of wine. Much of my life centers around eating and drinking (working in a bar as I do, also just really liking food as I do), so it's a real challenge for me to not participate in any part of food-and-wine culture for 2 weeks. So I'm trying to keep myself honest about how well (or poorly) it's going by writing everything down and exposing my challenges and failures to the public so that you all can hold me accountable. If we hang out in the next couple of weeks, don't let me drink that beer or eat that croquette. At least not without admitting to it online.

As far as cleaning my apartment goes, well that's just hard because I'm lazy and have a high tolerance for dust and stacks of paper. This is the first time I've had my own apartment, so I have no one to blame the dirtiness on but me. I also have no one to have a cleaning party with, maybe share a bottle of wine as we mop all the floors and switch wardrobes over from winter to spring. Of course I couldn't even have a cleaning party by myself because I can't have wine at all. Looks like I'll be washing my ceiling fan on my own and celebrating with a cup of peppermint tea.