Clean Sweep

Not that she would give a sweet sweep, but I am still mad at Marie Kondo, the self-styled "queen of tidy," for saying that no one should have more than thirty books in their home. 

I'm sure I have at least 30 books by or about each of these authors: Ring Lardner, Tom Wolfe, Thomas Wolfe, Jack Kerouac, and Joseph Mitchell.

So don't come @ me with getting rid of books, Marie. I mean, really.

And it doesn't change my thoughts on her to have read last week that Ms Kondo now wishes it known that tidiness went out the back door at her house when she brought three children through the front door.

"I have kind of given up on that in a good way for me," said Kondo, the author of The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing, a self-help book that took audiences by storm.

"Now I realize what is important to me is enjoying spending time with my children at home," the Japanese cleaning consultant recently told listeners, according to The Washington Post.

He big thing was always tossing out anything that doesn't "spark joy." 

"The fact that Marie Kondo, leader of millennials who were taught (by her) to only keep things that spark joy, has given up on tidying up her house now that she has 3 kids, is really sending me," wrote one person on Twitter.

Nope, having three kids is really going to cut into your time previously spent folding blue jeans and cleaning tile grout with an old toothbrush. 

Here's how Marie backs down from her former stance: She now says that keeping the hacienda tidy is only PART of her Shintoism, you see.

"The ultimate goal is to spark joy every day and lead a joyful life," according to Kondo, who describes this philosophy as kurashi, which she says roughly translates to "way of life."

Oh Marie, you are a delightful purveyor of nonsense, which I am reliably informed translates to Japanese as "Nansensu."

But I do agree. I just don't have room in my life or my bookshelf for this hysteria about how many books I can own.

But I do own none of hers. It's a start.