Closets

Netflix offered another Marie Kondo series, where she guided four homeowners in making their living space more habitable, or in the situation of a widow, the ability to repackage her later years.  None of the four had quite the clutter that I have.  As a senior living in a house with three levels, I know that a day will come when I can no longer do that.  The uncertainty is really whether I manage that or it is imposed on my wife and me.  While I do not want downsizing to be all consuming, I have to allocate part of each day to making it less burdensome on others who will inevitably inherit some or all the tasks.  

Marie has a five part system.  She does not do the decluttering herself, but processes the homeowners through what they need to do between her visits.  Leaving aside the pseudo-religious aspects, her process of sorting by type rather than region has some merit.  As a practical matter, if underwear did not bring me joy, I still could not discard all of it.  Yet as I watched the four episodes, with a little dozing and no recapture of what I missed, I recognized things that I like to have.  I like pens, briefcases, road maps, logo coffee mugs, and ties, accumulating far more than I could realistically use in large part because in their own way they probably bring me that element of joy that tries to get her clients to recognize.  And maybe I have a sub-fondness for zippered loose-leaf binders, too, as I accumulated quite a lot, buying an additional one whenever one on display attracts me.

Her five:

1. Clothing
2. Books
3. Paper
4. What she calls kimono, which is really the regional element that she cannot escape
5. Sentimental

Taking all wearables and putting them in a pile would overwhelm me.  I think I can go through types of items in one session: polo shirts, t-shirts, dress pants, casual pants, short pants, and the like.  Making part of a house, or even a bed, unusable makes no sense other than forcing the person to make decisions.  I am not going to do disruptive stuff.  She starts with clothing sorting each episode, as that probably gives the biggest bang for effort, and discarded clothing has ample charitable destinations.  Books also don't have great sentimental value, though destinations for the ones removed are sometimes difficult to find, other than the recycling center for paperbacks.

While I have endless sheets of paper, I also have more than ample file destinations.  While I would be better with less of it, writing a file folder label, sticking it onto a folder, putting the paper in it and alphabetizing the files goes easily.

But ultimately, what generates her popularity, or at least what I think is the deserved part of it, is the process that gives the best return on effort.

I have basement and My Space utilization as this cycle's Semi-annual initiatives.  The basement entails discarding things.  My Space, though, is really more about relocating stuff, either to storage spaces already part of My Space or to storage in other parts of my house.  To do this, I have to address where else might be better.  So my half of the bedroom closet, dominated by clothing, bedroom cubes also dominated by clothing, and the bathroom closets dominated by things essentially unusable.  I can pace myself through these while also modifying the Kondo Method for the books of My Space.

And I get to keep the loose leafs, road maps, pens, and briefcases.  But not all the ties and reconsider the mugs.