THOUGHTS

April 30, 2020

A repost from FB jail, 2014

I'm the Miss of Messy, the Queen of Clutter, the Your Highness of Hoard.

I'm inspired by blog posts that talk about purging, cleaning out STUFF.  I'm so inspired I sit here and read more blogs about getting rid of fifty things, organizing, letting go.  It's easier reading about it than doing it.  You would think I am a child of the depression the way it is difficult for me to get rid of STUFF: Such Terrific Undervalued Fantastic Finds. I'd rather you invite me over to sort through the boxes you are getting rid of.  I would be happy to dumpster dive into your cast-aways.

"Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful."

William Morris, British Arts and Crafts Movement

Well, that sums up what I feel about my stuff.  We used to move on a regular basis, so STUFF had to be sorted, boxed up or gotten rid of.  I have a faint memory of a garage a long, long time ago that we could actually park a car in.  Alas, once I've lived somewhere five years or more, it has become an avalanche of STUFF.   When I die, bury my ashes in the garage.  Just paint the garage door like a gravestone: here lies a woman who refused to let go.  I'm thinking I should of had a dozen or more children to whom I could leave it all to because the grown kids I have now are past the saturation point of hand-me-down things.

"A place for everything and everything in its place."

My garage is the beyond-disaster cave where there are crates of electronic cords from probably back before Bill Gates was born  There is a favorite printer which needs its drum cleaned, a spare microwave, and bins upon bins of Christmas decorations from when we had a house twice as big, not counting the Easter, Fourth of July, and fall decore.  I also have a trunk full of old picture frames, one of my parents' last leavings for sorting through, craft supplies, kids' school papers, old suitcases; well, you get the idea.  More is still oozing out of the house into the garage, mostly from the boys' rooms.  I think I have an idea for a new Disneyland ride: navigating the Garage of Doom!  It would be scarier than Mr. Toad's Wild Ride.

But what if I love it all?

"Clutter isn't just in your home, attic, garage or office.  

Clutter is also in your mind, and distracts you from

the amazing things you are meant to do."

Katrina Mayer

Which one do you believe?

It's time for a pretend move where I empty my cupboards and drawers and then put back only the stuff I have used in the last twenty-four hours, or was that twenty-four days, or twenty-four weeks?   Finally the two broken vacuums in the garage went out to the garbage cans as well as the stinky suitcase the kid threw up on at Shady Creek Camp.  Oh, and I also threw out the broken coffee carafe and dug through and pulled out the spare I kept for such a time as this.  Yes, I'm pretty smug that I had saved that for three years until it came in handy.  Well, that's four things in the past week that I managed to purge.  That's pretty good for me.

An update: actually now six years later, I have purged and down-sized to 700 square feet, thanks to friends and family who helped me sell, give-away, and throw away a great quantity of STUFF.  I still haven't quite made a place for everything so everything can't be in its place yet, but I'm working on it a little at a time.  The back of my car is rather full of things to get rid of once the quarantine is over.  

The Bible talks about letting go, laying aside,  "lay aside the old self, which is being corrupted in accordance with the lusts of deceit, and that you be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth.  Therefore laying aside falsehood, speak truth, each one of you, with his neighbor, for we are members of one another...Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice.  And be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you."  Ephesians 4:22-25, 31-32.