TheBanyanTree: Piles

[Margaret R. Kramer]

There is a show on the Learning Channel featuring different couples who have
one very cluttered room they want to declutter.  The show’s staff comes in
and helps the couple sort through their stuff and also remodels the room for
them.  It always amazes me how much junk these people will stuff into their
rooms.

Well, that was our garage.  There was so much stuff in there, I just had a
small space to park my little car.  And even that space was slowly
disappearing.  Our house itself isn’t too cluttered, mainly because we take
our excess stuff and store it in the garage.

Well, no television crew showed up at our house, so we had to begin
decluttering ourselves.  I got all the lawn furniture out of there and into
place on the decks and the patio.  That freed up some room.

We don’t have our dumpster yet, but that didn’t stop Ray.  He climbed up the
ladder and began to get stuff down from the rafters.  He began working
through the huge wood pile in the back of the garage.  He began going
through the shelves.

And we made piles, just like in the show.  There is the “keep” pile, the
“garage sale” pile, and the “dumpster” pile.  We weren’t as attached to our
stuff as some of the people in the show are.  They’ll stand and bicker about
what to keep and what to throw and would continue to bicker if there wasn’t
a time limit on their sorting.

While we worked, we had another pile, the “question” pile.  This was the
stuff we weren’t sure  what to do with it.  For example, the fishing reels
would go into the question pile or Ray would put some gardening tool in the
question pile.  Then one of us would make a decision on what pile it should
go in – throw, keep, or garage sale.

I always find it amusing when I watch the show how small the throwaway pile
is and how big the keep pile is.  Then the couple has another time limit to
sort through their stuff to bring this into balance.  I’m proud to say our
throwaway pile is HUGE and that’s just half of the garage.  And the keep
pile is very small.  I’m also proud to say our garage sale pile is
relatively small, too.  I want to sell good stuff at our sale and not junk.

As the afternoon wore on, the air got colder and the sky got cloudier.  The
forecast was for cold rain.  So we wrapped things up and headed into the
house.  We got a lot done for our first attempt to declutter and get the
house ready for sale.  There’s a lot more to come, but we did find out that
we can let go of our stuff.

Margaret R. Kramer
margaretkramer at earthlink.net

http://www.polarispublications.com
Be a star!

http://www.bpwmn.org
Business and Professional Women of Minnesota

The stars shall fade away, the sun himself
Grow dim with age, and Nature sink in years;
But thou shalt flourish in immortal youth,
Unhurt amid the war of elements,
The wreck of matter, and the crush of worlds.
~Joseph Addison