Tuesday, January 09, 2007

In Which Poppy Goes Down for the Third Time.

I like to think I write well. But I don't think I write particularly honestly. You'd never guess it, but I constantly re-edit my blog entries. Computers give me on-the-spot editing possibilities, and I use them to hedge, adjust, re-think, change the order of my words, delete the swear words, and otherwise be a lot more tactful than I really am.

But sometimes ... I JUST HAVE TO FUCKING VENT. For example, this morning I had a new team of cleaning goddesses ladies coming. For the first time in almost a year, someone else was going to clean my house. So I spent over two hours putting things away. After all, they deserved to be able to FIND THE FUCKING RUGS.

But to be honest (there's that word again) there was no "away" to put things. I was stuffing my daughter's fucking OBSCENE OVERLOAD of stupid, mass-produced, made-in-China toys into grocery bags and then shoving them into her closet. When the closet was full, I brought a few bags down to the basement.

The basement is still strewn with toys from my FUCKING Halloween party. And there's no space to put those toys away. Every shelf is FUCKING full.

And all these toys--can't be played with. If you actually tried to play with them, something crucially important will be missing. There'll be a missing Lego piece, or a piece of Monopoly money, or a die, or a Bratz foot, or a Bionicle, or a video game cartridge, or a puzzle piece, or a FUCKING Nintendo stylus that is not where it's supposed to be. Which makes all these game boxes so many sarcophagi. How can you play Twister without the spinner?

I think about taking it all and giving it away to the rummage sale. I think about eBaying things. I think about giving everything away to the poor and joining a nunnery. I think about explaining calmly to my children that even though we live in a consumer society, we don't actually have to accumulate so much FUCKING crap.

But who am I to FUCKING talk? I can't get mad at my kids; look at my bedroom. I have something like 30 bottles of perfume; half of my jewelry stacked in the gift boxes on my dresser because the jewelry box is full. Books are stacked up on the floor and lined up bookcase-style against the wall. I have so many shoes I can't remember what I own. I have two closets stuffed full of clothes--in three dress sizes. My bathroom is so full of makeup, shower gel, hair goo, and body cream that the tubs and bottles are lined up on the windowsill. And we won't even talk about my study, with its detritus of abandoned doctoral dissertation and waist-high pile of backed up filing.

I think about what it will take to de-clutter this house, and arson is starting to look like a viable alternative.

You know what? At the very least? I think it's time to put away the Christmas knick-knacks. And take down the tree. So I can breathe again.

10 comments:

  1. We are feeling the need to do a great
    DE-CRAPPIFY as well...
    I left some shoes from the hall closet in a charity box yesterday - the vacuum no longer fit in there.

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  2. I had that problem, and I solved it by not caring.

    -Mr. Helpful

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  3. I feel your pain Poppy. Sometimes I get the urge to secretly move out of the house to a tiny apartment, bringing nothing with me but the clothes on my back :-) Where I could then start accumulating more stuff....

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  4. I'm glad I'm not the only one with too much clutter.

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  5. I'd love to come help you purge, but I'm afraid your children would soon hate me. Susie can testify to my bizarre love of putting order in other people's homes.

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  6. We used to build more storage (a/k/a garages) when we lived on acreage.

    Then we finally broke down and bought a bigger house. And it's still completely full of junque.

    BUT -

    I am down to ONE closet. I donated, gave away, threw away. It has taken 3 years to have what I have in the closet be my current size and something I will wear. Including shoes. I got rid of 100's of pairs of shoes. That was the most difficult thing of all of it. I allowed myself to save 3 pair that I will never wear again - just because They Have History.

    This consumerism? It's a sickness, I tell you. Just because we can buy everything doesn't mean we should. How will our children ever be able to leave home and afford themselves?! We're setting them up to expect a very high level of luxury and comfort.

    We are STILL opening Christmas gifts here, speaking of consumerism run amok. *sigh*
    Miscellania
    How'd the new cleaning crew do?

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  7. After you've done the initial purge for charity and thrown the unsalvageable in the trash, have Wendy over.
    The woman will change your life and house around in a couple of hours.

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  8. I feel your pain.

    And our tree's still up. Good thing it's fake or it would spontaneously combust.

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  9. It's like I'm looking into a mirror. I'm always fighting the good fight against clutter. Mostly I lose.

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  10. One of the major benefits to NY tiny apartment living is that you can't keep things. There's no place to put them: no closets to speak of, no attic or basement, and no storage unit.

    Whenever the rugrat and I get anything new, like clothes and shoes, we have to give something up for goodwill first. Sure, we definitely have 'stuff,' but I'd never be afraid of, for example, packing for a move.

    Hey, I have to find the silver lining of not having a budget that will get us a house, or a real apartment.

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Gentle Readers:

For the time being, I have turned off comment moderation. Please don't spam; it's not nice.

xxx, Poppy.