Folding Sweaters, Avoiding Dumpsters

There’s a lot I want to talk about. The ADHD is more dominant right now, though, so my brain is a pinball game and my words are moving too fast for me to catch them and put them together to say the things I want to say. Sometimes I can just open my mouth and let them come out on their own, but this time I feel it’s important for me to organize the words like I organize my client’s things.

You are Here

I folded sweaters and hoodies, separating them by weight, by whether or not they were 3/4 or had hoods. The cashmere ones went together, and they were all tidied up before they went back into her closet. The lot of them were messier before they were tidier, because tha

t’s how it goes. I wasn’t worried about it, because I knew all I had to do was keep folding, and pay attention to what folding methods worked, and what didn’t.

It’s always messier in the middle of things, and that’s why it’s hard work.

A different client said to me today “I wish there was a fast-forward for decluttering.” She admitted moments later that, if that were the case, we’d just go right back to where we were before, right into the same old mess.

I said “Well, there is. It’s called getting a dumpster and chucking it all away.” But yes. If you do that, you’ll just accumulate again. And if there was anything precious lost in the mess, it’s gone.

When you’re at the point when it all starts to blur together, in a swirl of unpleasant colors and shapes, or maybe all turns gray, and invades any hope you had of relaxing, of enjoying your space? You feel helpless. You are not.

And no, I don’t know if I am talking about physical clutter right now or (waves hands about to indicate the state of the world.) It’s very likely I am talking about both. I believe that I am talking about both. I am talking about both.

I tried to make the funny videos to say these things. While I can make those, I could not for this. I tried to make something short and punchy. Again, could not for this.

I wake up each day filled with joy, because I have the most wonderful family, and I live in a wonderful town! Then the rest of the world wriggles its way in, and I am confronted with the anxiety of my husband’s health, and the length of his job search. It this near the end, or is it the middle? We don’t know. I am reminded of the parents mourning their children, the towns that are devastated.

It would be easy to look away.

It would be easy to get a dumpster.

To learn nothing. To risk losing precious things in the mess.

Who we were is in with the broken things and the old mail. Our empathy is with family photos.

What a mess. What a mess we are in, my dear ones.

But I do think that that now, the contents of our closet are getting dragged out. We don’t want to look at it, because it will embarrass us. It will bring out grief. It will be scary. But we can’t figure out what we’re going to do with it all, until we face it.