bien dans sa peau

'Good in one's skin.'

It's a French expression describing when things are good. (Incidentally, many people accurately used it to describe feelings of the Spirit, evidencing to me (at least) that God is alive and well and working among the children of men.)

I'm not bien dans ma peau when my house is a mess. Is that weird? If we pull the sheets off the bed to do laundry (which has been known to happen) and we don't immediately replace them with the backup set, very often this leads to going to bed at the end of the day too tired to put the sheet on. So we very lazily lay a blanket down to sleep on and go to sleep. I feel like white trash. I never get a good night's sleep that way.

Likewise with sleeping in. If I'm not up and doing something productive by 9, I feel like the day is wasted. I feel lazy and indolent. I feel like white trash.

Likewise with showering in the morning. This dry western air drys my body out, so if I shower in the morning, then my regular body oils (yeah I said body oil) don't return to normal when I go to school. I just feel dry and icky all day.

The biggest problem is when my house is messy. This might be borderline OCD, but... Whatever. I LOVE a borderline bare room, vacuum lines on the floor, clean bathroom and nothing blocking my path from the bed to the can for quick and easy access at 2AM. I feel good when there's no scum buildup on water surfaces. I love seing an empty sink. I am absolutely bien dans ma peau when the front room is sparkling and I can sit and stare at my tank.

I am a neat freak. What can I say?