"Well, I'm Not Messy, But I'm Not Neat Either"

At least, that's what I tell myself. I really do think that over many years of marriage and responsibility I have evolved into Homo Domesticus (Almostus).

I cannot really explain this phenomenon. I only know that as a single student my room was so cluttered that the spiders were complaining to the landlord. And that now, although I do still manage to clutter the joint, I am relatively speaking, a neatish person.  I am just as likely to be found moving things to their PROPER place, as I am to be leaving them lying around. In fact I have become at heart a wannabe minimalist who would love, if I could find a legal way of getting rid of all the children, to live a simple life. With a chair. And a plate. And a knife and fork. And not much else.

It is known for me to TELL the children to move THEIR stuff. OK, I do get a bit of the old hypocrite's guilt as I recall the look of horror on Ineke's face when she saw my student pad. But I tell them anyway.

And connected to this I have come to love efficiency, as though my Saxon  genes had, after many years buried at the bottom of my personal gene pool swamp, managed to fight their way to the surface. So if a thing is worth doing (because if you don't do it you will be feel that remorseless stab of Procrastinator's Stitch under the rib cage) then it is worth doing once. And only once. Why would you want to repeat an activity, other than the pleasurable ones, when the repeating of said activity could have been avoided by careful planning.

So I think I have made my case. I am a New Man.

The only fly in the ointment?

It's very frustrating, but Ineke will tell you that I am still a right messy pup. She is the proverbial hard nut to crack. And I would try harder to crack it, but have you noticed what a mess cracked nut shells make?


The line "Well, I'm not messy, but I'm not neat either" is from this month's Fee Comes Fourth tune, Cleaning Out The Shed.

“Sometimes I’m a Dragon, I Breathe Fire”

Yeah. It’s true. And there is a place for fire breathing. Especially when it comes to bringing down the bad guys.

But it’s not really the thing for domestic situations. However, anyone who has spent any amount of time living with me knows that, despite being a peace loving bloke, it is not unknown for me to have outbursts of fairly intense shouting. Otherwise known as losing my temper. It is not an attractive feature.

I’m the kind of person who feels things very deeply and passionately. And I think a lot about right and wrong. I came into adult life with a lot of insecurity and a tendency towards depression, which at times in my life has bordered on the suicidal. In the past all my frustrations and emotional turmoil was directed inwards. It was very self destructive, and it didn’t make living with myself very easy. Or easy for those around me.

There was a point, and I’m not quite sure when that was, when I perhaps started to get a sense that I wasn’t the cause of everything that was wrong in the world. I became more balanced, and started blaming persons and situations outside of myself. Which was a kind of step in the right direction. But depression got replaced at times by anger. And that isn’t easy to live with either.

But I’m at a time in my life where I’m doing something about some of the bad habits that I’ve developed over the years. In the widest sense this is simply about taking responsibility for my world, my actions and my speech. I do of course have some good characteristics, and I learnt a long time ago that a guilt complex does nothing to change behaviour. But putting a name to the bad ways is an important part of change.

Which is what I am doing right now.

ps. I asked my wife to pick the song line for today’s blog.

The line “Sometimes I’m a Dragon, I breathe fire” comes from my song A Human Being which is on my album of the same name.