We’re an Episode of Hoarders Waiting to Happen
You may think I’m kidding. But I am married to a pack rat, and I hate to clean. While I do fairly well at keeping my closet trimmed down, papers pile up everywhere. When it’s time to clean off our dining room table or living room shelves because people are coming over, I do a quick look through of paperwork to decide what can be recycled right now, but anything I’m iffy on gets put with the must save paperwork and then goes to live in a pile in the “office”.
The “office” also happens to be our guest room (and my closet). So when we have people coming to stay, I need to pick up enough so there’s a flat space for them to put their things, and I certainly don’t want all of our financial paperwork out and about. Do I go through it then and shred what needs to be shredded? We bought a shredder and it’s right there in the office. But no. It gets stuffed in a shoe box or some other place and put in the top of the closet or in other storage spots.
That room is really a catchall for everything I don’t want to find a place for, but that we want upstairs for easy access. (You don’t even want to know about my basement which has the remnants of the store inventory from the hobby store C and former roommate E owned back in the 1990s, as well as other stuff E collected before he moved out of state, that C did not want to seen thrown away. We also have all of our holiday decorations down there, as well as things my parents stored for me from the time I was a baby, and the majority of the contents of my MIL’s old 2 bedroom condo. And 2 mattresses and a box springs. And a rolling white board. And a couple glass display cases. We did get rid of the giant robot hand a few years ago, but still, the basement is a no-go.)
The back of the Giant Robot Hand (lest you think I was joking)
Due to some upcoming changes, I really, really need to get the office turned more into a bedroom. That is going to require me to DECLUTTER. And I mean seriously. I know that if I tackle it all at once, I’ll get tired and start stuffing things away again. So I have a goal to do just a little bit each day. To start with putting my laundry away so the bed is clear, then move everything that’s on the desk to the bed (except the computer) and go through that. Just little pieces at a time.
Why is this on my financial blog? You have no idea how much financial paperwork is in that office- not just ours, but the MIL’s, too. We need a better filing system for it. In fact, we should consider investing in a nice locking filing cabinet- one that could maybe work as an end table in our room, instead of the guest room.
I need to decide how far back I need to keep documents and what can be shredded.
I also have 10+ years of critique notes in there (dating back to when I started my writing courses). I need to decide what I’m doing with those. I don’t have time to read through every one. I think my goal there is to throw out notes from pieces that are completed or permanently abandoned. (Over 5+ years into my first novel, I realized there really wasn’t enough of a plot there.)
The problem comes back to the fact that I hate to clean. I always have. (This drives my mother crazy to no end. She has no idea how I could be here daughter.) If my mom weren’t retiring this coming spring and therefore saving her money and her vacation days for a nice payout when she leaves, I’d invite her up for a weekend to help me. But that’s not going to happen this year. I have to learn to clean on my own.
The sad part is, I really like having a clean house. I love how clean my house is right before guests show up at the holidays. I like the sense of control and accomplishment cleaning gives me. And yet, I don’t like those things enough to overcome my inherent laziness or my dislike of the cleaning itself.
But this time I have a pretty big reason for wanting to clean the room. It’s not quite ready to be shared yet, but I am hoping it gives me the motivation I need to overcome my world of excuses.
HAHA. The giant robot hand made my day. So much in fact that I had to include this in my weekly roundup! Thanks for starting my day off right!
WooHoo!
When I say C and I are geeks, I'm really not lying.
E got the hand from a WotC store that closed. When he moved out of the country 7ish years later, it came to live out our house for a couple of years. We decided it wasn't bringing anyone joy living in our basement, so we Craigslisted it.
That night, someone who was as stoked as we all were when we first got it came and took it away. I hope they are still enjoying it.
I am a borderline hoarder too (luckily I never had anything like a robot hand). I make a mess out of the place and when someone is coming I stuff everything in a closet that has space. Then I forget about that and buy more. Last December we did a major purge and allocated a specific closet to stash thing and within 1 week after the visitors are gone, I should make it empty again. 1 month in, it has been working so far. But it does take a lot of time and effort from my part.
If only this house had more closet space!
I need to do something like that- have a designated place for junk, and then make sure I keep it cleaned out.
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OK, I'll bite, what is a robot hand? Did it actually belong on a robot? Did it ever do "handy" things like move?
Good luck with your de-hoarding, it is a difficult task.
What is a robot hand? It's a hand, from a robot.
Except that this was made from wood and was never attached to any robot- real or fake. It did nothing but lie there and look cool.
It was a decoration at the Wizards of the Coast store in Seattle's U-District. When the store closed, our friend E, who worked for WotC, bought the hand and brought it home.
I find that my messes are related to a lack of organization. If I know where an items goes, it is easily picked up. The problem is what to do with the things that don't have a place?
What I needed to do was buy a house with wall to wall closets.
I never want to clean, but I usually force myself to do it every few days. I think it's me getting older and nitpicky, but I can't stand even looking at shoes piled up by the door! Things pile up in my closets and desks pretty fast…I usually do a declutter of everything every few months and throw stuff out. In a tiny one bedroom, you have to stay clean or you'll go crazy.