Now I know why it takes me so long to get around to doing the Really Big Chores - like the big clothing sort n' toss I've been working on this week. It's because my slightly ADD brain, when it finally focuses in on something.....can't....let.....go. I made up my mind to very sensibly sort a box or bag or 2 a day. Today I have to wear one of my wrist braces because I overdid it with moving around big heavy bins and carrying monstrous amounts of stuff needing to be laundered.
Also, much of the clothing (mine, at least....I know what does or doesn't fit the kids) needs to be actually tried on. An odious task that - especially when you're sorting winter things and it's 80 degrees and humid. I keep vacillating as to how ruthless I want to be with the sorting - on the one hand, if I toss everything I haven't actually worn in the last year (like the experts recommend) I will finally be able to fit all my clothing in its allotted spaces. On the other hand, sometimes I find myself needing that odd bit of clothing - for a costume, a messy job, a camping trip, an unexpected cold/warm snap. And the sorting process itself is a walk down memory lane. That seems to be exclusively a "woman thing". Oh look, there's that cute dress I wore to work a lot when my husband and I were dating! And there's my favorite sweater that looked so cute when leggings were in the first time around. And the adorable miniskirt I pranced around my college campus in (yes, they go back that far - hush - I'm sorting it *now* that's what matters).
In the interest of not driving myself crazy, I'm trying something I read about. All the stuff that I can't/don't wear and is not sentimental - goes. The few things that are really hard to part with will get packed up in a special consider-it-again-a-year-from-now box. At this stage of the game, *anything* I can get out of this house or pack neatly in a labeled box is a plus. Twenty plus years of sorting will not happen overnight. It's sort of like weight loss - for my house. It didn't get cluttered overnight, and it won't get uncluttered overnight.
I'm working against 18+ years of training by my Depression-era parents. Like Flylady says - baby steps. Itty bitty baby steps, if necessary.
Except yesterday it became slightly addictive. I kept finding "just one more thing" to sort. Ended up feeding the kids ramen noodles for dinner - oops. Well, they were happy, and I was happy with a good day's work done.
1 comment:
days of overdoing are good to bank against those days of underdoing that inevitably come. having just done a major purge, I can attest that there are things you might toss and miss...but not nearly as many, or as much, as you might think. What was useful to us in the past is not necessarily useful to us now, and memory doesn't need very much to jog it. All the best to you in your process!
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