An Obsessed Organizer

My name is Preeti Sharma and I am an Obsessed Organizer. There, I have said it! I can almost hear a collective sigh emanating from harried souls around the world – half a dozen ex room-mates who sacrificed many a weekends to the crack of my cleaning/dusting/arranging whip, a bunch of friends murmuring ‘we always knew’ under their breath, a set of parents who cannot stop blaming each other for passing on the ‘hyper-organized' gene to me and finally one poor husband who has to deal with it for the rest of his life.

At first my symptoms mushroomed as seemingly innocent quirks. Arranging my dolls in a perfect straight line so that they sat in ascending order of their heights on top of the olive green cupboard in my room gave me immense satisfaction. Inside this cupboard was a treasure cove of books which also adhered to one of my many patterns of organization-alphabetical, author-based, subject- based……..What passed off as adorable nuttiness should have set a hundred alarm bells ringing and perhaps the condition would have been nipped in the bud.

As I left the pristine boundaries of home to hunt for the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, I found myself staring at a big, bad, MESSY world which lay like a repugnant pool of spilt tea on a marble floor, waiting for me to wipe clean. I began yearning fervently for a world where pairs of shoes were organized in neat stacks on shelves instead of lying asymmetrically crooked on the floor, a world where coats and shirts were hung separately instead of mixed together, a world devoid of specks of dust enveloping all exposed surfaces, a world where dishes were done immediately after a meal and dabbed dry before being replaced in designated spots inside cabinets, a world where clothes always smelled laundry-fresh and tidily occupied allotted slots…my wish list went on.

I walked a tightrope for many years, trying to balance work, friends, hobbies and my unrelenting fetish for patterned harmony in spaces I called my own. Truth be told, I was always happiest when I was engaging in some good old fashioned housekeeping. An ensemble comprising a pair of comfy pyjamas circa 1998, an over sized tee from the same era and a head scarf to keep the powdery dust off my crown of curls easily kicked the rear end of pretty dresses and dainty heels. And eventually I started trading in parties for spending time dolling up my house. Since my most favourite section at the super market has always been the one which stores all sorts of cleaning products, I invariably possessed a plethora of objects to help achieve my standards of perfection in the task at hand.

State of the art mops and brushes, surface cleaners which promise a spotless clean house - fragrant like flowers in spring, glass cleaners to scrub window panes so perfectly that for a minute one would wonder if there was any glass at all, thick blue toilet bowl cleaners and a multitude of detergents (one for keeping my woollens supple, one specializing in retaining colours, a fabric conditioner to pamper my favourites, starch for my cotton 'kurtis', a stain remover for times when clumsy people subjected me to the horrors of their gaucherie…..) - This was my ammunition to wage a personal jihad against the forces of filth. When I was done banishing trash to the confines of a trash bag, I focused on arranging furniture, books, clothes, accessories and other things in exact locations and positions, just as my heart desired.

They say ‘Hell hath no fury as a woman scorned’. My private version is: ‘Hell hath no fury as when you spoileth what Preeti arrangeth’. Loved ones understood and resorted to rolling their eyes and toeing the invisible line I drew. In return I sometimes offered to do up their rooms for them. Like a whimsical artist I admired my handiwork every few hours for the next couple of days till my almost satanic arch nemesis - dust and grime - found its way through cracks and fissures and lay dirty, mangled, gaunt fingers on my spick-and-span dwelling. And then the entire cycle repeated itself.

After years of filth-fuelled crankiness and working myself to death, I have finally realized that sometimes it is all right to coexist with a tiny modicum of clutter instead of driving everyone, including myself, insane. To be honest, despite this epiphany, I still jolt out of deep sleep once in a while to stow away a pair of errant socks which somehow found their way on the living room couch or to wipe off ring-shaped coffee stains left behind as a stubborn mark of defiance by coaster-less mugs. I suppose the journey to a neurosis free life is long and difficult. But I am determined to reach my destination and am slowly inching forward.

Now that I have written this cathartic article and the weight is off my chest, I want to get back to what I was doing earlier – polishing the kitchen counters till I can see my reflection smiling back at me, giving me the thumbs-up... Satanic grime, here I come!