Romancing the Genres: clean the house

Friday, April 6, 2012

Clean? Do I Have To? by Judith Ashley

No, not our house in the background

I grew up in a family where my Mother had certain standards of ‘cleanliness’. We didn’t have plastic on furniture nor did we take our shoes off just inside the door, but we did

         - change our clothes as soon as we came in from school or church on Sunday,
         - do the dishes every night right after dinner, and
         - clean our rooms every Saturday morning (unless we wanted to miss getting our allowance and going to the Saturday Afternoon Matinee).

There were more chores than listed above but the biggest challenge for me was meeting my Mother’s high standards for cleanliness.

In my fantasy life, my family (whoever is in that configuration at the time) pitches in with housework, yard work, cooking, whatever needs doing. Over the years, I’ve tried Family Meetings, Chore Lists, Rewards (dinner out for example). Nothing my creative mind came up ever really manifested my fantasy. Even with just my youngest granddaughter and me at home, it still isn’t happening.

Why?

The truth is that neither of us likes housework/chores and neither of us have a ‘clean gene’. In the past, I’d clean if I knew people were coming for a meeting or to visit. I’m less fussy now and really don’t care what friends who stop by to visit or spend the weekend think of my housekeeping skills.

What about cleaning this one?

My granddaughter and I sit down every few months, write up a plan to keep the house clean. We commit to it and even follow it for a few weeks or even a month and then something comes up and we put the plan aside for just today or this weekend. Except we never really get back to it. We still have times when we do clean – it just gets too messy and dusty for even us. But for the most part, we just live in our house, keeping things up (we aren’t hoarders, you don’t need hand sanitizers if you stop by, and you will feel comfortable using our toilet) to a standard that would horrify my Mother.

In my dreams, I’m published and my books sell well. The first thing on my ‘dream list’ I’ll do with that extra income is hire someone to clean the house! Do you enjoy cleaning house? If you do, please share why. I’m curious to know. Maybe it will help my granddaughter and me to do more in our home.

Pictures by Mariah Klefman

www.JudithAshleyRomance.com

www.JudithAshley.blogspot.com

Thursday, April 5, 2012

I've an INVITATION...to Scandal

I live in two worlds. The real world where I spend my physical days and nights, and then the Regency world that swims in my head and makes me have to type my stories.

I love both worlds. I often find story ideas by comparing the day I’ve had and thinking about what my day would have been like in Regency times.

For instance, I’ve been away at a conference for several days and I’ve come home to a pretty messy house and loads of washing. So I’ve spent the morning doing the washing, vacuuming and dusting, and cleaning bathrooms. It only took me a couple of hours.

But in Regency times it would have taken me all day! For a start I’d have to heat the water as there were no taps I could simply turn on. The washing would have been done by hand and that in its self would have taken me all day and rubbed my skin raw—no rubber gloves.

I would have had to take rugs outside and beat them thoroughly to get the dirt and dust off and I’m not sure dusting would really have gotten rid of much dust as there was nothing to shift it outside. i'd have simply stirred it all around.

If I had been born a ‘Lady’ I would never have had to lift a hand to clean anything. My servants would have done everything for me, including washing my hair if I’d wanted.

I suppose I could hire a cleaning lady in today’s world, if I wanted (not sure I’d want them to dress me or wash my hair though.)

Rheda Kerrick, my heroine in my new Regency romance, INVITATION TO SCANDAL, released later this month, is a ‘lady’ but she is forced to ‘work’ to save her family home for her younger brother. No house cleaning for her though. Smuggling and horse breeding are on her agenda. It’s such a pity that the extremely handsome, Rufus Knight, Viscount Strathmore, is set on catching a certain smuggler. It’s making Rheda’s life more perilous than she’d wish.

Here is the RT Book Review

RT Rating 4 Stars

With snappy dialogue, lively action, a hero that believes in honor above all and a strong heroine who loves fiercely, Evans’ story will have readers laughing and crying, savoring every scene.

Rheda Kerrich has been helping the townspeople and trying to hold on to the family home for her brother in her own unconventional way, as local smuggler “Dark Shadow.” She has one last shipment to deal with before retirement, but then Rheda gets stuck under a barrel of French brandy and is found by Rufus Knight, Viscount Strathmore.

He is immediately attracted to Rheda, thinking she is a simple village girl. Rufus is in Kent to find the smuggler and decides to seduce Rheda, but he will not rest until he finds the Dark Shadow — the only one who can clear his father of treason. But the closer he gets to Rheda and the truth, the more dangerous things become. (BRAVA, May, 320 pp., $15.00)