This Week's Word: Clearing
What an oddly appropriate word for today. I have been meaning to tackle the ever-growing-mess that I call a domicile for about a month now. I never fully unpacked after moving in, so the mess is lined with boxes, packages and suitcases filled with things I was convinced I could not live without two months ago. This provides a sort of lining, the second layer in is made of mostly important papers that I mean to file because they might be important.Or, you know, fliers and coupons that expired three years ago. In the gooey center is bedding and art supplies, because instead of cleaning or unpacking or doing anything I prefer to sit in the middle of everything I own (which is all on the floor) and make art while huddled under a blanket. Why? Because I'm awesome like that.
I have decided that one of my problems is I just have way too much stuff. This is because I am in a transition period between child and adulthood. I know you're thinking this is supposed to happen in our teenage years, but I don't think we ever quite get there in college, it is not until we enter the work force full time that we begin to realize that we are never actually are going to pick up the guitar at this point in our lives or learn German or knit our own wardrobes out of yarn we spun ourselves (that's just me? okay then.) I still have all the things for those crafts though (well, I don't have a guitar). I've realized that as an adult, I need to really stream line my hobbies because now it's a trade off game, if I want to make art I can't sew my own wardrobe, if I want to maintain a blog then I can't learn another language, if I want to play video games I'm probably not going to be making my own furniture. My first thing I need to do is say a mournful good-bye to all the might-have-beens I have dreamed up and started on over the years and get rid of them. I need to prioritize my time and space for the things I really want to dedicate myself to and pursue.
Another one of my problems is I don't make use of storage space. I tend not to put things in cupboards or boxes because if I can't see it, I will forget about it. This is how I end up with six sticks of deodorant and three tubes of toothpaste. I am apparently a very visual person and I have to be able to see and touch everything. My few forays into the use of cabinets and boxes has never ended well. Either the cupboard ends up open all the time with stuff spilling out of it or I end up with canned tuna of questionable origin and age. This is also why I love shelves, they make my messes legitimate because they are vertical instead of horizontal and I can still see it.
Unpacking has been taking so long because I now have this thing called "space." In my last apartment, the places things went was largely determined by where they fit, most things larger than a shoe box only fit in one place, so that is where they belonged. Now I have enough room and enough rooms that I can put anything anywhere I want to and apparently that much freedom is too much for me to handle. My parents got me a drawing desk for my graduation present, which had been sitting in the trunk of my car and now on my porch for about two months now because I couldn't decide where to put it.
But these things are the troubles of the past! For New Years I am clearing out my "dining" room and converting it into a studio. It will be marvelous, if only because I'm hoping by the time the sun dawns on 2011 I'll be able be able to walk through that room and not bounce about like a frantic deer trying to land on all the clear patches of floor space. I'll try to post an "after" picture Saturday or Sunday (depending on how long this project takes me). I'd post a "before" one, but honestly, I think my parents have lost enough faith in me for one holiday. There are cleaner rooms in the rubble of a demolished building.
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