I'm nesting again. Perhaps it's a way to mark time on my internal calendar, or a way to hasten the transition between seasons, but this compulsion to freshen and fluff my surroundings is always worse in the springtime.
"Nesting" has become a buzzword to describe a period of settling in and settling down, getting cozy and relaxing at home. Not at my house, and not in nature, either.


Nesting is a time-sensitive, high-pressure period of intense activity. Robins will battle over a piece of string the way two women charge after a throw pillow in the clearance aisle. Sparrows risk life and wing to snatch a bit of fluff from a terrier-patrolled backyard. All for the sake of building a nest for the coming summer season.   

My family has accused me of trying to cause them bodily harm by rearranging the furniture and disrupting established traffic patterns. And while it seems perfectly reasonable to me during this annual drive to alphabetize the spices and relocate every item in the kitchen for greater efficiency, it sometimes takes them months years to reset their KPS (Kitchen Positioning System) to the new location of the silverware or the hot pads. I know they hate it, but I'm helpless under the onslaught of this nesting instinct.

You can feel it coming on the way you know a storm is moving in. There's a change in the way the light angles through glass filmy with winter's leftover grime. Maybe there's an ominous rumble from a cluttered closet. Your heart pounds a little faster and you flip through that magazine article on "how to organize your home like a pro" one more time. Senses heightened, suddenly every chip in the paint and scuff on the floor is in dire need of immediate care. Couple the craving for cleanliness with a rapid-fire succession of bright ideas for decorating your house, crafting new and adorable tchochkes, creatively rearranging your bedroom for the umpteenth time, and you're left with one very frantic bird female.

There must be a way to approach nesting without the Martha Stewart spring cleaning to-do list that's worthy of publication as a three volume set. Surely other people do their spring cleaning AND find time to garden, and decorate, and try out new and entertaining artsy-craftsy projects. Or have I, and so many others, been deceived by our housekeeping magazines and home arts gurus? And since I don't have to actually build a nest, where DOES all this pressure come from?