How does the Yin and the Yang apply to window cleaning?

A wise man once said, “There are two sides to the universe. One side has dirty windows and the other side clean. This is the Yin and the Yang of window cleaning.”

Actually, I don’t know how wise he was. I was in a coffee shop and the two guys at the next table were playing chess. I just happened to overhear their conversation. My first thought was that he was joking. But, as I thought about it, it occurred to me, maybe he wasn’t too far off.

The Yin and the Yang are concepts of Taoism. The idea, as described in the Website www.personaltao.com, is that the Yin and the Yang have “Two halves that together complete wholeness.” We’re all familiar with the symbols of the Yin and the Yang. But, if the chess player in the coffee shop was serious, how could he think that the Yin and the Yang could apply to window cleaning. That’s just crazy, right?

Aha, not so fast.

Reading further in the Personal Tao Website, you learn that Yin means shady side and Yang means sunny side. Yin means night and Yang means day. These concepts, or definitions, are easily applied to window cleaning. Ok, maybe we need to stretch them a little to get there but, to humor our chess-playing friend, let’s go there anyhow.

Presumably and clearly, if you’ll pardon the pun, according to ‘the wiseman’s definition,’ Yin represents dirty windows and Yang represents clean windows. Now, to achieve equilibrium in the universe, you may want to have only half of your windows cleaned. Maybe, if you have vertical double-hung windows, you can clean the bottom halves for your Yang and the leave the tops dirty, for your Yin. If they’re side-by-side double-hung windows, where possible, you could clean the southern side – the Yang – because that side is closer to the sun. If you have casement windows, you could measure to a halfway point and clean to that line.

Then again, you might achieve the Yin and the Yang of window cleaning by only cleaning the outside of your windows and leaving the inside dirty, unless you’d prefer to have the Yang closer at hand, in which case you’ll want to clean the insides.

There’s also the possibility that the Yin and the Yang of window cleaning is a temporal matter – the windows are clean sometimes – the Yang – and dirty others – the Yin. This works out well if you clean your windows once or twice each year. Since winter is the Yin of the seasons, and summer the Yang, you can clean your windows in the summer and leave them dirty in the winter.

The drawback to dirty windows in the winter is that, with cabin fever, it’s rather nice to look out, through clean windows, on a pristine blanket of snow while sipping a cup of coffee, with or without playing chess. Then again, maybe you should seek equilibrium elsewhere in the universe and allow the Yang to dominate your clean windows year round.

Don’t get caught up in a Griswold Christmas Vacation – have the pros put up your Christmas lights

“Nobody’s walking out on this fun, old-fashioned family Christmas. No, no. We’re all in this together. This is a full-blown, four-alarm holiday emergency here. We’re gonna press on, and we’re gonna have the hap, hap, happiest Christmas since Bing Crosby tap-danced with Danny … Kaye.”

― Clark W Griswold

Does the 1989 movie, “National Lampoons Christmas Vacation” cut a little-too close to home? You love the holidays. And the decorations are beautiful, once they’re up. Well, they’re bright and colorful, anyhow, even if your husband, who, around the beginning of December, seems as though he’s possessed by the Ghost of Griswold past, tends to put up too many lights in random and disassociated … can you call them ‘patterns?’

Putting up the holiday decorations is an annual ritual, though more an act of insanity, isn’t it? How long will it take to untangle that massive ball of last-year’s lights? And how many times will your husband cuss before the strings are untangled? Once the Christmas lights are untangled, how many of those strings will work? How many strings of lights will work just long enough for your husband to dangle precariously from the ladder and install them before they go out like the punch line to Christmas comedy?

Of course, you don’t watch him putting up the lights. The experience, watching and waiting for him to fall, always leaves you breathless with terror. Besides, there’s the deterioration of his language. Well, who needs to hear that and, hopefully, the neighbors won’t. It’s better just to stay inside and hope for the best until he’s done, though you do keep an ear pealed for any loud thuds that might indicate a need to call an ambulance.

Then there’s the tree. Putting up, and decorating, the tree would probably be more fun if it didn’t somehow always occur as an extension of the frustration caused by putting the decorations up outside. If you could just relax enjoy it as a family activity. Instead, you almost expect a squirrel to jump out of the tree even though it’s an artificial tree you keep up in the attic the rest of the year.

Take a deep breath. Make some hot chocolate, have a seat and think about it. Isn’t it true that the Jones’s across the street have lights beautifully strung on their home each Christmas? Their Christmas lights are installed with purpose. The Christmas lights even seem to favorably accent their home. And have you ever seen Mr. Jones out on a ladder installing their Christmas lights? It’s as though a little Christmas magic carefully strings the lights along the gutters, eves and windows.

Come to think of it, haven’t you seen a work van in their driveway every year around Christmas time? Men with ladders get out of the van and go to work. But you’ve never really paid attention to what they’re doing. Could it be their putting up the Christmas lights?

Just think of the possibilities; professionals will come to your home, people who know how to work safely from ladders, who use good, quality, ‘working’ Christmas lights, and who know how to install the lights with the care and detail of professionals. The only Clark W Griswold you’ll see in your house is the one of the TV screen when you pop the DVD in while casually decorating the Christmas tree.