Overwhelmed: The feeling I get every time I (translation: David nags...er, encourages me to get rid of a few things) finally think I'm in the mood and ready to minimize all the crap-I mean precious memories-we have accumulated after 50 years of marriage. I have fantasies of a completely clutter-free home. Sick, isn't it?
One of our sweet granddaughters moved in with us recently to be closer to her college and workplace and we are loving having her here. Unfortunately, the only spare bedroom we have is filled to the ceiling with 'keepsakes.' The fact that the majority of these keepsakes are clothes I'll never squeeze back into is beside the point. We also have two cedar chest-type pieces filled to the top with photos and old major headline-of-the- day newspapers my mom passed down to me. My sister got our grandmother's rolling pin and I got the newspapers. I don't what any of them are since I haven't opened up either chest in years. I lift the lid just far enough to cram more photos in and shut it quickly.
Anyway, the point is now that our granddaughter is occupying the room, I'm being forced to empty most of the drawers and move the old clothing from the guest bedroom closet to my office. Keeping anything in my office's 'Fibber McGee' closet is out of the question since it's stuffed full of craft supplies that I'll probably never use again. I did purge several items from it some months ago, but I swear that stuff self-multiplies at night. It was all nice and neat when I finished but now it's a jammed-packed mess again.
Now that I've transferred all the things from the guest room into the office, I'd better start figuring out what to do with it before David threatens to do it himself. That would not end well for me. Unfortunately, that room is also holding a lot of the Christmas paraphernalia we've not gotten the gumption to haul up to the attic. I read somewhere that back in the olden days - circa 1960 or maybe earlier, I can't remember for sure - it was considered bad luck to take the tree down before 40 days after Christmas - or was that a flood? Anyway, I figured since the black-eyed peas and grapes weren't helping, I'd give this a shot for good luck and you know what? I'm officially sick of my Christmas decorations. That is a statement I never thought I’d hear myself say. By this weekend it will all be back in the attic, the lounge chair will replace the tree and there will be rejoicing in the streets. Or at our house anyway. The kids and grandkids gave up on us long ago. Rest assured that I, good luck or bad, will never, ever again leave my tree up this long. As much as I hate putting it away, I'm hating it being up this long more. Time will tell if this experiment in luck-giving was a success or failure. I'll keep y'all posted. Maybe. Or maybe not. You know how I am. In the meantime, maybe I should start hunting for a four-leaf clover. Couldn't hurt.
But I digress as usual.
Several times a week I'll enter the twilight zone of offices, determined to organize and purge only to look around at the amount of work it would entail, get overwhelmed, back out slowly, and close the door. Out of sight, out of mind.
This room is also filled with the myriad games I've purchased to keep the grandkids entertained. Otherwise, they'd expect me to do something more physical than sitting at the table playing board games or cards. Putting any games back in the game closet requires an enormous amount of skill. It's kind of like playing that game where you have to remove pieces without the whole thing falling. In this case, I must carefully place each game in a certain way for them to fit. The kids grab a game, everything becomes crooked and just like unboxing something that came to your door, nothing fits back, so I end up having to remove everything and start all over. It doesn't help that I keep adding to the collection.
I also have several large toys I haven't figured out where to keep and that is why I get overwhelmed and accomplish nothing. Well, that and the fact that I just know the minute I give away or throw away anything I'll develop a sudden need for that particular item. I can't just willy-nilly choose what to discard so it'll all stay in there with the door closed. Overwhelmed or not, David is throwing out some not-so-subtle hints so I'd better get busy. I'll get to it. I swear I will. Tomorrow. Tomorrow looks promising.