Handbasket Ready

I live in a cluttered house. A messy house. A "bursting at capacity with stuff that has no place to be put away because we just don't have a place, we are maxed out, at capacity, and ready for a giant purge of old things" house. According to Peter Walsh, professional organizer and current decluttering guru darling of Oprah, keeping a cluttered home and an overweight body often go hand-in-hand (oh, Oprah, what don't you know about me?). I'm guessing that also attempting to be a good wife, raise a three-year old, finish graduate school, work-part time, support a husband's grad school completion, and be a kind daughter/sister/niece/cousin/neighbor/friend could contribute to the high level of "scattery brain" that makes finding places for random things that have no place that much harder. That's just a guess, though.

This week was the topper. I have succumbed to the fact that I have toys and knick-knacks in every room in my house, including the bathroom, my bedroom, our office, etc. When I'm feeling particularly motivated, I try to at least arrange these pits of clutter into neat piles---sure they shouldn't be where they are, but at least they are neatly stacked. I've also become more and more accustomed to falling behind in laundry duty, and since our hamper is in our main bathroom, I know that when I'm tripping on boxer shorts on my way to wash my face, I have to drop everything and try to beat back the piles of dirty clothes.

Friends, if you are wondering why you haven't been invited for some impromptu playdates or dinners lately, I think the boxer shorts say it all.

Yes, this bothers me (especially feeling like I can't invite people over without notice), and no, it isn't always fun dealing with the clutter. Truthfully, though, in the short-term, it is survivable, and it will most certainly change in time. I simply cannot devote my extra time right now to boxing up old toys, clothes, etc., to make room for the stuff we actually need easily accessible, which means that the jumble of random stuff everywhere will continue for a bit (at least as long as we own our kid, who finds things that I have packed away routinely and brings them back into the mix.) When it gets overwhelming and I need a boast, I go through one small area, sort out stuff I don't need, post those things on Freecycle, then get that happy natural high when someone comes to my building, climbs the three flights of stairs to our door, and picks the stuff up, usually with a giant smile on his or her face.

This week, though, I made a discovery that stunned me. While roasting a chicken for dinner on Friday night, I reached up to a very high shelf inside one of our kitchen cabinets to retrieve a ramekin that I was planning to use to soften a few tablespoons of butter. It was a real stretch---at just over five foot, three inches, I can't access our top shelves very easily. I often say a little prayer as I reach for our tower of ramekins on this shelf, hoping they don't all topple over and shatter on the kitchen counter in front of me. The smart thing to do would be to pull out our kitchen step-stool to bring them down without peril, but because I'm just tall enough, I rarely make that effort. On Friday, though, I was in luck---there was only one ramekin left, which meant a counter full of shattered white porcelain was probably avoidable.

Oh, I avoided that. What I did not avoid, however, was the retrieval of a toddler-sized sock that had been stuffed into this ramekin. That's right, a sock. Somehow, a clean dish was stuffed with a children's sock, then placed on a high shelf. I have no idea how long it was there, but it could have been awhile, especially since this ramekin was at the bottom of the pile.

That was too much. When the laundry starts ending up with the dishes, we have reached full-tilt. The house is officially heading to hell in a handbasket, as the phrase goes. All aboard! Ramekins, cereal bowls, and tumblers will be available to pack all of your clothing---please enjoy your ride.

At least it will be warmer.