A Daunting Task
It was a dark and stormy… morning? Today was a rare windy, rainy day in Florida. I got my run done very early, took my daughter to school, and then settled down at home to wait for the electrician. He gave us a window of 8-12, and as I looked outside I thought “How lucky am I to be able to stay home today!” Since I knew I would be home all morning, I planned to tackle my disastrous closet situation. Before I show you a before photo, let me explain. There’s a special challenge to South Florida houses. We have no basements. And we have no attics! Well.. we have a very shallow attic, but you can’t store anything up there unless you want to burn it to a crisp. Our house was built in the 1970s, and for some strange reason when they were building houses then they also didn’t think we needed big closets. What I’m trying to say is, we’re very challenged, storage-wise. Okay, you been warned. Here we go… I mean… I literally can’t reach the clothes in my closet. But don’t worry! The clothes I actually WEAR are over here… And, the clothes I really, really wear, like my workout clothes and work clothes, basically cycle between the washing machine, a drying rack in the garage, and back onto my body. Most of them never even enter the bedroom. So what is all that crap, anyway? A lot of it is holiday decorations. Since I’m the holiday decorator in my house, I’ve taken it upon myself to store it all in my closet. I’m currently reading this book: She likes to reframe things. Instead of “household chores” you should call them “care tasks.” Care tasks are morally neutral, as in, if your bedroom looks like, er, well…mine, it’s not a moral failing. And instead of saying “This place is a mess!” you should say “This space has reached the end of its functional cycle.” I think we can all agree that my closet had reached the end of its functional cycle. I dove in and found some interesting things. Like my Snoopy Halloween shirt that I was searching frantically for the entire month of October: And some wrapping paper I had no idea I had: I do have to wonder what I was thinking though. I mean… koalas wearing glasses? I’m usually pretty picky about my wrapping paper and can’t imagine buying this. Oh well. I filled a large bag with garbage, and another bag with donations to Goodwill. I didn’t actually try on any of the clothes in my closet (that was a little too advanced for me, in this session) but I did take about ten shirts I knew I would never wear, and put them in the donation bag. The end result is nowhere near perfect: That green bin and basket in the corner are filled with Christmas things, but I also felt like it wan’t the best moment to go through Christmas boxes. My goal is to pare down my Christmas things this year so when I put them away in January THEY ALL FIT IN THE CLOSET. No more spilling out. Oh, and you may be wondering. “What’s up with the little kid’s dresser?” Yes, I took that dresser from my son’s room when he got a new one, because I was tired of sharing a dresser with my husband. Maybe it’s time for some adult furniture? So, whew. I was really dreading that task, and now my closet is functional again. It was a morning well spent. Do you have any areas of your house that have reached the end of their functional cycle? Are you contemplating calling the Department of Health to have my house condemned? -Don’t worry- the rest of the house is nowhere near that bad!