A pause before resuming...

Last night, I was too tired to do anything but wash dishes and put away laundry  Note how this implies (though I am not admitting anything out loud) that I didn't put away my laundry when I did my laundry two days ago. After I have already promised myself not to do that.

Bad girl.

Well, it's put away now, in all those shiny new places.  Thinking it through: If all goes well, I can finish the bookcase project this weekend, leaving two more weekends in November, one for the kitchen and one for the hallway.  I'm not sure which is more intimidating; but I remind myself that so far each of my projects has looked intimidating, but ended up being not so bad after all - just time consuming.  And needing effort.  But nothing unmanageable.  Nothing discouraging.

Meanwhile, the challenge is to get enough sleep, and go to the gym each day, and to do yoga each day.  I am both surprised and gratified how this gives me the energy to carry on with the decluttering. I would do it anyway; but this makes it easier.

The order to do things:

• Read another book on how to declutter and/or minimize. I got another one out of the library, and don't want to return it unread.  It's called the Clutter Diet: The Skinny on Organizing  Your Home and taking Control of Your Life by Lorie K. Marrero.
• Empty the bookcase by the front door.  Dispose of it. Find or buy paper to cover the magazine boxes as necessary. (Note: go to The Papery after work tomorrow. Find out their hours.)
• Switch the books in the bookcase by the bathroom into the two brown bookcases that were in the bedroom.  Discard books as I go.
• Move the comic book boxes in the bedroom from the north wall to the east wall.
• Move the large bookcase in the living room into the bedroom, either on the west wall or the north wall - whichever fits best.
• Put the small bookcase in the space behind the front door.
• Put the teapot display shelves (formerly a bookcase) in an attractive spot in the living room.

Moved and seconded, and so resolved.

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What's the next step?

I'm keeping the process of decluttering fluid, and one thing tends to lead organically to the next.  But I do love to make lists.  It keeps my brain sharp; keeps me focused.

My list for the next things to do:

• move comic boxes from one side of the bedroom to the other (harder than it sounds!)
• empty the bookcase by the door
• switch the two brown bookcases in the bedroom for the Billi by the bathroom, and put the books from the Billi into the replacements
• move the brown bookcase in the living room into the bedroom

Call it my strategy for the rest of the week, though there are other, smaller things to work on, too, that I might do when I have a few minutes - the shelf in the hall closet, the top of the wardrobe (which is attracting Stuff like flypaper), a kitchen shelf or two.

But the very next thing to do: put away the clean laundry.  It's in a basket on my bedroom floor. It shouldn't be there.  It really shouldn't.
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Desk, bottom drawer, fulfilling the task it was born for...

Last night, my task was to file the papers I'd sorted from the clutter on my desk and shelves.

Painstaking, but absurdly simple.

Papers are now filed in the file-drawer in my desk, in files labeled ART,  BANKING, BILLS, COMPUTER, HISTORY, MANUALS, MEDICAL, PAY, POETRY, RECIPES, RENT and REVENUE CANADA.

Fits nicely, too.
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the joy of less..

I'm halfway through reading the joy of less by Francine Jay - whose name I keep remembering as Felicia Day. Oh dear.

It has some fabulous advice, but it is so not written with my lifestyle in mind.  She talks about all the extra clothes in one's wardrobe - and yes, I have things I should pare down even now, but that's never been my problem. 

I've read her chapters on bedrooms and the living room - and there's a huge elephant in the room. My major stumbling block, and she hasn't even mentioned it yet.  Books.  Books and bookcases.  Where are her books?

She talks about having a bedroom that is geared only to sleeping, clothing and maybe grooming.  Not a word about books.  My bedroom problem - and we are not, for the moment, talking about the boxes of twelve thousand comic books - my bedroom problem is bookcases.  It also happens to be my living room problem.  And my hallway problem.  I have, at a quick mental count, twelve bookcases. No, thirteen, I forgot the little one by my pantry.  And I'm not counting at all the shelving over my desk, which has some books on it.  So: thirteen bookcases.  I'm hoping to get it down to four by Nov. 17.  Can I do it?

Well, maybe. "Four" is a very abstract number.  Fewer would be too much of a sacrifice. Five might be okay.  I rather like that little one by the pantry, though I don't want it to be there - and don't know where it should go.

Work in progress.  Right.  Some things reveal themselves as time goes by.

Alternate book venues:

1. They could go, with bookends, on top of my dresser and on top of my comic book boxes.  Fine for the dresser (though an uncluttered top is nice), but it renders the comic books a little more inaccessible.  Not to mention the books.

2. They could go in boxes in the basement.  I don't think it's good for them - I once had a drippy pipe down there, right over a box of comics.  It did no harm, but that's a comic collector's nightmare.

3. I could purge more. I've already purged a lot.  Yes, really.  Bookcases seem to fill up embarrassingly quickly.  And I do most of my reading from the library. There's a message in that, but I'm not sure what. If I could get all my reading from the library, I would.  Unfortunately so many of the books I need and want are not available in libraries, or electronically, either.

It's all in the musing stage, right now...

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Zones and the joy of less..

I have been reading the joy of less by Francine Jay, a book about decluttering and minimalizing.

At first I found it preachy; but it has some good advice. I like its idea of thinking of the home in terms of zones, depending on use, and keeping the paraphernalia of that zone in that zone.

So I should determine my zones.

Book zone - Currently there are bookcases all over the living room and bedroom.  I plan to amalgamate, and to get more of them in the bedroom, fewer in the living room.

Desk zone - South end of the living room.

Bird zone - The cage is on a desk to the east side of the living room, between bookcases.

Entertainment zone - television and DVD payers, Acer Aspire, IKEA DVD shelves - all need to be pared down and consolidated.  North and east parts of the living room.  And this is related to my Entertaining zone, the sofa and chairs where I and my friends watch DVDs.

Clothing zone - Wardrobe and chest of drawers in my bedroom; closet in the hallway; bin in the locker in the basement.

Supplies zone - Cleaning supplies are in the hall closet and bathroom cabinet under the sink - and under the sink in the kitchen, too.  The system works, but needs refinement.

Sleep zone - Bed and bedside table (which is actually a set of full comic book boxes with a board over them).

Cooking zone - Kitchen, though this probably has five distinct parts:

• Storage zone -  paper towels, tea towels
• Cooking zone - pots and pans, implements like wooden spoons and knives
• Eating zone - canned foods, dried foods, flour, sugar
• Fridge zone - food inside the fridge and freezer
• Tableware zone - cups and glasses, plates and bowls

Am I missing zones?  yes:

Exercise zone - Treadmill in the south-west corner of the living room, with the yoga mat and balance cushion. I was thinking of getting rid of the balance cushion, because I've never used it: but it might still be a good idea, if I push myself. My balance really does need work.

- - -

From seed to blossom...

A few months ago I walked into a friend's house and thought: this is what I want.

It was a beautiful, peaceful place.  Not elegant, but not shabby, either. Decorated more with taste than money.  What I loved was that nothing was extraneous.  A living room with sofa, chairs, a bit of art; a plant.  Dining room with table and buffet.  Nothing special... but enchanting.

I want this, I thought.

I can do this, I thought.

I haven't done it yet, so it's time to start.

My place isn't a mess - not by my standards.  But I have too much furniture, too many books (is that an oxymoron?), not enough empty places to put things.  This can all be fixed.

Since I like to research projects - and it's a fine form of procrastination - I looked up the subject online.  I attacked it from three angles:

1. Moving out the clutter
2. Making it simple and beautiful, yoga-like and calm
3. Putting my life in order in other ways: saving money, making better use of my time

This is my quest.

There are many blogs and websites on the subject, most of them useful.  I kept coming across the same factors that make the sites a bad fit for me:

1. Sites about how to declutter a large house, assuming the declutterer has a spouse, kids, a garage and a car.  I have none of these things. I have a small one-bedroom apartment and three budgies. 
2. Sites which go too far: the people who live with 100 possessions only, which makes me wonder "is a pair of socks one object or two?" and "how do you deal with paper clips?" One package would be it.  Though of course, if you have no need of paper, you have no need of paper clips.  I have a way to go before I get there.  I want to be minimalist, even Spartan; but not stark.
3. Blogs which are defunct. The information on them is still good, but there's a static quality to them.  I am looking for encouragement, inspiration, a sense of immediacy.
4. Do It Yourself sites that give instructions on how to make all sorts of ingenious things, but which are based on the idea of "having more things with less" while I want to "have fewer things".

So I decided to write about my own process, and how I get there.  The theory and the practice.  The challenges and the (I hope) triumphs. Special bonus challenge: I want to do it without buying anything for the project. Ingenuity is the key: I don't need to spend money to do it.

My goal: to have a clear and beautiful place by Christmas.  "Beautiful" by my own standards.  "Clear" in terms of "free of extraneous things" and "purposeful and elegant".

Can I do it? I plan to prove it.

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