The Cleaner

I am working on my second year here at the apartment complex. I moved in here when we decided to end the marriage and my habitation at the Murray house. (Of course, you dedicated readers know that because I've chronicled some of that information already in this document) For most of the first year I survived without any help in keeping my apartment clean. Actually, I did have some assistance from family, a previous home health professional who is kept in contact following my mood and helped clean this unit before an apartment inspection. I really appreciated her willingness to help “straighten” up my unit. You would think I'd be interested in something like this on my own. Truthfully, I have never been very good at keeping my environment, my personal environment ordered. Gradeschool desk, bedroom, work area, study and always been chaotic at best left to my discretion.

As Fall approached last year I had to do something. I really begin to feel my mental health kind of suffering from living in the mess of my apartment. I mean it wasn't the kind of stuff that Department of Health would come in and shut me down. It was just messy and I was tired of the mess. We have a general laundry on every floor, you know, coin-op washer dryer. To get to the laundry I have to pass the community bulletin board and there I saw those for me advertisements for cleaning services. This was posted by Cindy. I took a picture of the ad with my cell phone then asked the department manager but she knew of “Cindy”. Jennifer, the building manager, is a personal friend of Cindy. Cindy has been cleaning units at this apartment complex for years. She had a number of clients here. Jennifer gave her major thumbs up.

Honestly, I would probably have engaged the services of a cleaning person sooner had I better control our knowledge of my finances. This is a long story not to be told here right now. Maybe someday. Regardless of finances I had to take a chance and get the cleaning person. I really like Cindy. She works hard and she talks to me. I know this sounds pathetic but I really yammer a lot when she is here. She wanted me here for the first couple of visits just to find out what I wanted in the area of a clean apartment, how clean, do you want this clean, you want that straightened, where can I put this? We have a pretty laid-back arrangement we do about $20 an hour and I talk a lot. We usually do about three or four hours of work but Cindy charges me for like 2 ½ usually 50 bucks. She likes the talk, she says that talk helps her concentrate on cleaning.

I'm pretty cheap meaning they don't spend a lot of money on stuff other than rent, food and Internet/Amazon prime movies usually. I have enough to pay 50 bucks every two weeks or so for apartment cleaning. I call the service mental health. I love the feel of the place when Cindy is finished. I don't want to move for fear of messing things up or getting things dirty. I just sit in a quiet of my clean apartment and enjoy.