Sunday of Lesley

Clutter Begone!

I'm not home much so I don't watch a lot of television - I never watch anything on network tv anymore - but when my tv is on, it's usually on BBC America, History Channel, or The Learning Channel. And I never much cared for The Learning Channel until I discovered an interesting fact about myself: I am absolutely addicted to home makeover shows. Specifically, making over junky rooms...if there are professional declutterers and organizers, I'm all over it! "Trading Spaces" doesn't do much for me, but "Clean Sweep" is my porn. And even better is the BBC version, "Life Laundry."

If you've never seen these shows, the idea is that professional organizers go into the most horribly cluttered, junky house that you've ever seen. They take every single thing out of two rooms and lay it all out on the lawn...tchotckes as far as the eye can see. The homeowners then have to throw most of it away, which is the really fun part. Weepy mothers trying to justify why they need to keep their son's first diaper. Middle-aged men hanging onto leisure suits, because "you just never know." Keeping a set of nasty, broken furniture because their dear departed mother once commented favorably about it, so now there's a huge sentimental attachment.

The hosts aren't heartless, but they try to break people of a lot of aimless sentimental attachments. It's funny, the Americans get very defensive when confronted about their junk, while the English people always cry.

Anyway, they have a big garage sale for all their stuff, then their house gets a makeover. I start to lose interest at that point.

I don't know why I enjoy these show so much. It isn't the handy organizational tips one can pick up...though it is nice to know how to make your closet ultra-efficient, I think I really just enjoy seeing the home lives of lazy packrats.

I've always had a thing about seeing inside other people's homes. As a kid on Halloween, I wouldn't be eyeing the candy that the adults clunked into my plastic pumpkin; I'd be looking over their shoulder, checking out their houses. Now that I deal with appraisals all day, I spend my work hours gleefully flipping through pictures of houses both stunning and junked alike.

I used to be a packrat. I found it very easy to get very attached to things, but at some point in my adult life I realized that things are just things; they're not the people or the memories that are connected with them. All of my furniture was given to me by family members, and I suddenly decided I wanted my OWN furniture, my own style. There are a few things I will probably always keep...my grandfather's desk, my favorite childhood books, a teacup that has been handed around in my family. Old letters I keep in a wooden wine box. But really, I think the world has become such a complicated place (maybe it's me getting older and wiser, maybe it's the war and terrorism, maybe it's always been this bad), that I found being attached to, say, a table just wasn't worth it. It was bogging me down.

I keep thinking of the movie "Hope and Glory." The little boy's beloved toy soldiers have melted in a fire, and while all the death and destruction of wartime London haven't fazed him, he cries over his soldiers. And his mother sighs sadly and says, "They're just things, Billy. They're just things."

The funny thing is, I'm not a big shopper and spender; I didn't really get that girl gene. But even so, man, I had a lot of STUFF, accumulated from who knows where. So I decluttered. No more dust-collectors on shelves. My clothing was pared down by about half. I was ruthless about books, CDs, videos, Christmas decorations. I only have one closet in my house, and it was so full I could barely get in it. Not anymore! Gone are things I vaguely thought I might need one day. I took carload after carload to Goodwill, and it felt fantastic. The only problem is that now I don't have anything left to declutter! Now when I'm at friends' houses, I'm itching to fling open their closet doors and sort, and to sweep all their "collectibles" off tables!

Posted by Lesley at February 5, 2004 11:16 AM