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Sunday, November 18, 2007

GOT JUNK?

Cleaning out his mother’s basement after her recent move, Max found a lot of cool things—old letters, forgotten toys from his childhood, pictures, and well . . . junk. Things his mother thought she might need someday. Useful things stacked on shelves and gathering dust. Max spent days of sorting, choosing what to save, what to give away, and what to pitch. His experience made me wonder what my kids would think one day going through my treasures.

There are two lines of thought here. One is that it’s payback time for your kids for all the years you sifted through their things and picked up after them. The other is that you don’t want anyone to know what a packrat you were. The lazy side of me tends to like the first choice. Out of sight, out of mind—closet shelves that sag with the weight of my stash of goods.

There’s something in me, though, that feels I should get more organized. Heaven knows, a lot of my stuff still has a little life in it and could be put to good use. Clothes that aren’t totally out of date, sewing supplies that a crafter would like, old luggage that a thrift shop client might take a shine to.

Today, I tackled the closet in the spare room. Three piles: trash, give away, keep. I’m not through yet, but I am glad to say that the first two piles were bigger than what went back into the closet.

I think I may start on my spiritual closet next. What junk am I hanging onto in there? Grudges? Pride in my own accomplishments? Selfishness? What could I be giving away? My time? A donation to a food pantry? Support for a mission project? A kind word to the overworked checker at the grocery store? Off the top of my head, I’d say I have plenty of work to do.

How about you? Got junk? Tell me your closet cleaning secrets.

2 comments:

Myra Johnson said...

Great post, Carla. Watch out, or you'll motivate me to start doing some closet cleaning, myself! I thought we'd done a pretty good job before we moved 18 months ago, but I'm afraid we still brought a lot of stuff with us that we just don't need.

And I like the way you tied in the idea of cleaning out our spiritual closets. Way too much junk there, too!

Bonnie Way aka the Koala Mom said...

I'm a weird combination of packrat and organizer, so at least once a year (if not every six months) I'll go through my closet/desk/room and start throwing out things I haven't used in a while... What I'm not looking forward to is doing that with my husband in a year or so when we have to move and downsize a bit. :) And as for spiritual closets... well, the physical ones are easier to deal with! Good reminder that junk piles up both places and needs to get dealt with.