After what seemed like an eternity of winter and snow in Ottawa, Kingston, Montreal, heck…. CANADA, it’s beginning to look like spring is starting to unpack its bags and settle in. HURRAY! Give us all a minute spring, let us tidy up a bit.
If you’re living in or renting an apartment, you know exactly what I’m talking about – things can get a little cluttered during the winter months. Why is spring cleaning such a timeless tradition, and how old really is it? People certainly don’t clean exclusively in the spring, so why does this season get preferential treatment? To the interweb I go.
A history of the age-old cleaning practice in our culture, from the lovely and way-too-helpful Wikipedia, is thought to have originated from the Persian new year, which falls on the first day of spring. The practice of “khooneh tekouni”, translating to “shaking the house” is still done at this time every year, where everything in the house is thoroughly cleaned from the drapes to the furniture.
There are also similar traditions in Scotland with their “New Years cleaning”, the ancient Jewish practice of cleaning before Passover, and in America before the invention of the vacuum cleaner where March was the best time for dusting and opening the windows and doors.
