I think my girlfriend Emily had been using some kind of hypnosis, mind-control spell on me for weeks before we even noticed. She started to suspect that something wasn’t right when she made an off-handed comment one night before she went to bed. We were watching a movie on the couch and she decided she was too tired to finish it so she was just going to go to bed. Before she got up, she asked if I would straighten up the living room when I got a chance. She meant sometime over the next few days. There was no specific rush. Under normal circumstances, I would have taken it that way, but this night I didn’t.
After she kissed me goodnight and went to bed, I started having a really difficult time paying attention to the movie. I kept zoning out. The room did seem messy. There was so much clutter. How did we live like this? I started noticing everything that needed to be wiped down or scrubbed. I saw dust on every surface. In my head, Emily’s request that I pick up a little bit of clutter had ballooned in importance and intensity. Our filthy living room needed a deep clean and it needed it right that moment.