I though most mathematicians needed amphetamines to work.
I really don't like stimulants, but we have (painfully) been decluttering the house this year. The minor basement flooding didn't hurt as an incentive to start getting rid of stuff.
We now have less clutter upstairs despite having lost storage space in the basement to our new habit of keeping a fuckton of food and other supplies on hand instead of just buying when we ran out.
I really wonder if there would be a sweet spot of house size where I'd find it easier to maintain, or if I'd always just grow to fit the size of the fishbowl and not make an effort to change until I felt this exact degree of emotional tension, regardless of house size. Some extra closets seem like a nice idea.
So far I've done okay in the new bigger place. There's some clutter on tables, but little on the floors and shelves - in the living room, at least; still several boxes and old computers without disposition in the bedroom. Having a roommate and housecleaner probably helps.
I guess we could use more storage but what I really want is to not share a bathroom with a teenager.
Stuff keeps showing up in the mail and I keep having to deal with it. Mail is just a constant, incoming stream of clutter.
This post inspired me to finally buy an extra freezer, which is the house-related thing that's been driving me insane. I had tried to solve it by better storage inside the freezer, but it failed miserably. Also this freezer will double as extra counter space.
The pantry problem is trickier...
The basement pantry we created is kind of a pain to get to, but it does serve.
7: Unless you get magazines, most mail can be dumped in recycling and the small reminder can go in a filing cabinet without filling it up quickly. In my singleton experience at least.
I guess you're talking about it piling up before it's dealt with. Regardless, I recommend a firm hand. (My building's mailroom has a recycling bin which is great.)
8: I have fantasies about having a chest freezer and being the kind of person who will vacuum seal meats in advance, freeze them and then cook delicious sous vide meals during the week.
Our mail comes right into the car hole. Very convenient.
12: Where do you get seal meat from? Or is that part of the fantasy?
If you have a club and a boat, you can get it easily.
14: See https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/reviews/best-vacuum-sealer/
If you splurge for the chamber style, you can do liquidy foods too. My other fantasy is making a lot of chili in the instant pot and making a bunch of individual servings to freeze without getting plastic containers dirty or putting all of my Pyrex dishes in the freezer.
16.1: I was all ready to proudly refuse to click on that link, because I'm supporting the union, but then I found out the union and NYT reached a deal. So, now I'm just refusing to click because I'm against clubbing seals.
I'm still angry about the fucking email thing.
17: If you have a gun club, you can shoot the seals.
This is a timely post. I'm only back in NY (leaving early Friday) because the new job will send me from my point of origin (JFK) to Arrakis business class along with 500lbs of my stuff all on their dime. My dad has been at me for some years now to deal with the stuff I've left in their basement and the movers just came today and packed up over 200lbs of it to ship. Unfortunately I couldn't ship all my old computer equipment because the customs regulations are onerous or any antique weapons (and old Moroccan dagger, Iranian ceremonial axe, and a native American war club) because that is forbidden so that stuff remains.
20 Among the shit I can't believe I'm shipping to Arrakis, is around 60lbs of papers related to my divorce some 16 years ago. I guess I'll just have to throw it out when I get there.
I have a chest freezer in the garage which was great until my wife started keeping dead birds she found on her various travels. With her gone for the month, I'm excavating and recovering bison steaks from some time in the past -- they're well preserved (double wrapped), so no consequences so far.
Ok, so when I was a kid I used to visit my grandparents every week. They had an old (moderately old) barometer in the hall and literally the first thing I did every time i arrived was run over, climb on a chair and tap it to see what the weather was going to do. I was mildly obsessed with it.
My grandmother died a few years ago and her possessions mostly got divided up among her children, but the barometer went to me - because of my childhood obsession. That's the only thing I had of hers - of any of my grandparents really except photos and a few books.
But it stayed in my parents' house until this year (partly because I didn't have a very big flat to put it in) when I came home for Christmas and my mother (who did not like my grandmother at all) told me she had given it away to charity. I'm going to try to recover it but not hopeful.
Relevant because decluttering.
Damn, I forgot to have them take all my vinyl LPs, not that I have a turntable in Arrakis but still.
My wife has been getting plants, which is not as much trouble as dead birds.
I got involved with citizen oversight of our Recycling and Solid Waste Department the past few years. We got a report that during COVID, people have been doing a ton of decluttering. Household trips to the dump are up by a third. Curbside junk pickups are up by half. There's no sign of it slowing. It is definitely a phenomenon.
I hate, hate, hate clutter, so I'm pretty motivated about it all the time. I was ruthless with Steady. "Nature stays with nature." So he doesn't really try to bring home rocks and sticks anymore. I have parent friends who support the collecting and I look at their gathering rocks with horror. (Heh. Helped them move, too. Validated everything I ever thought.) I keep on top of the art, keeping some to photograph, but throwing all of it out eventually. He makes a ton of origami stuff and I occasionally sweep drifts of it into the trash. If his dad tries to buy him toys, the toys have to go back downstairs after playing. No creeping stuff into my upstairs. I'm constantly re-stacking mugs and toys by the front door to go back down.
One unfortunate consequence is that that is partly why I waver on screens. Steady doesn't have much to do or play with upstairs. I do always have tons of library books for him. Library books leave after, which is another reason to love them.
My two helpful prompts are "clutter is unmade decisions" and "it is already in a landfill, just that I've moved the landfill into my house." But mostly I deeply resent anything that enters my house and deeply love anything removed from my house. No! I shout as people approach the house with objects. That has mass! And volume! It may not enter.
My sister is about twice as intense as I am on this, so I still feel like I'm reasonable.
I'm still not as de-cluttered as I want. But there are definitely clean horizontal surfaces in my house.
I'm mostly indifferent to my surroundings. Clutter doesn't bother me at all, but I also don't have the urge to possess things.
My wife hates clutter and loves to shop. My role is to be a referee in the her ongoing war with herself.
26 Her plants don't do well in the freezer, do they?
23 That's really unfortunate. I suppose her dislike for your grandmother overcame her memory of why it was in her house?
30: I think so. It was surprisingly upsetting. Like being burgled, but more so.
30: We don't have the freezer space to try, but I think the ivy is getting to unreasonable lenghts.
17: peep, I would not have linked to them if they were still on strike!
"it is already in a landfill, just that I've moved the landfill into my house."
I definitely have a hard time with clutter, and the hardest part of decluttering for me is that, even when I've identified something that I'm ready to part with, I'm faced with another set of decisions, "should I give it away, donate it, recycle it, etc. . . ."
Obviously, that reflects of a mix of psychological concerns (1) is it okay to just toss it in the trash? That feels wrong along with, (2) do I have an accurate sense of value? Even if I'm done with it, does that mean it's worthless, or would somebody else want it.
It's exhausting, but I have not yet figured out an easy way to bypass that step.
38.2: For certain kinds of objects, my way around this is to leave them by my trash can (my trash is collected in the alley behind my house) and see if anyone will take them.
We once had one of those water tables for toddlers. I was wondering how to get rid of it and a few days later some woman walked by with a toddler and a baby. So I just asked if she wanted one and brought it to her house.
people have been doing a ton of decluttering
I wonder how much of that is decluttering, versus buying more shit that they then discard, because they're stuck at home and need more diversions / get more improvement ideas (Roombas, etc.). There are so many packages in my building's lobby almost every day it puts me in mind of a big subway-width tube with cardboard boxes perpetually flowing through it.
27 is amazing and incomprehensible to me.
I blame Cassandane. Seriously. I say I don't want to get things because they'll become clutter and she ignores me. I could easily throw things away, recycle them, or take them to Goodwill if applicable, but no, she has to try Freecycle or Nextdoor app first.
My two helpful prompts are "clutter is unmade decisions"
This is true, but how is it helpful? I don't know what to decide! After all, if you get rid of something that you associate with someone you love, then that person will die and you'll ache with sorrow that you haven't preserved everything they touched. No?
And unsurprisingly, I find Charles' story unbearably sad. I'm so sorry, Charles!
I have a hard time parting with sentimental items,* and over time all items, no matter how mundane, accrue sentiment. But I can't bear clutter, so I force myself to get rid of things. It's a lot of emotional work. I try to trust myself to carry an emotional memory of my sentimental items, which allows me to purge the things themselves. (Photos and actual mental memories are work and clutter of a different kind, so I absolve myself of photographing or actually remembering the items.)
It's so much simpler to not acquire new items in the first place. Desirable objects usually become less so once they're inside my house. Once I realized this, it became easy to enjoy objects without seeking to own them. When I do buy a thing, I make myself think about when and how it will leave my house. Most objects are just guests in my home, and if I make a note at the outset of the length of their anticipated visit, it makes it easier to usher them out at the end of that period.
*I read the Marie Kondo book, and while it was mostly not for me, there was one nugget of wisdom that I found really helpful -- the value of a gift lies in the joy it gives to the giver in giving, and to the receiver in receiving. Once the act of giving is completed, the object itself can be disposed of. I have only internalized this maybe 80%, but even so, it is so liberating.
I really wonder if there would be a sweet spot of house size where I'd find it easier to maintain
My house is pretty small -- about 900 square feet. I often wish it was a little bit bigger -- I'd love to have room for a bedroom vanity, for example, or a full dining table. But, I'm also glad that I don't have any big closets that I could fill up with unnecessary stuff, or an attic where I could stash things and then forget about them. I have two (small!) junk drawers in the house, and I have to go through them periodically or else I get anxious about forgotten items might be lurking within.
48 last is one strong reason why aside from a super small circle of family i give only consumable or perishable gifts. chocolates (or pâtes de fruits, marron glacé, those luscious prune-stuffed-prunes), wine (or spirits), flowers - all but the closest people get one of these. all the giving & receiving pleasure, none of the stress of where to put it, how to use and/or maintain it, & god forbid it's just really not anything the recipient would ever ever want or voluntarily tolerate in their home. in the event the flowers/wine/sweets aren't wanted, they are easily passed along or disposed of without the giver ever needing to know exactly how they disappeared.
On a certain level, aren't all prunes stuffed with prune?
Clutter is the result of children. We recently recycled two big tubs' worth of Pebbles' artwork, which comes home from preschool/kindergarten daily, at the rate of about five sheets per day. (me to teacher: "does our tuition cover the reams of paper?"). Shiv can't bear to throw it out, so the stuff I couldn't manage to intercept went into the tubs. They just tossed three quarters of it as part of pre Christmas cleaning.
It's nuts. More and more of my life gets crammed in the office as the kids' stuff expands to consume my house. We have system of organization so it's tidy but it's still like a growing threat. A phantom menace.
pruneaux d'agen fourrés = ideal prunes
re generalized clutter, i grew up with a lot of it stirred up with generalized chaos. it imposed a significant drag on my mental state, while not equipping me with the skills to avoid the situation in my own home once i had my own. the better half was raised by a meticulous housekeeper (managed to keep the best batman and/or batwoman at various air force bases against poaching/outranking efforts bc despite having five sons she ran such a clean & well organized house it was the best gig going) & carries on in that spirit which i have gratefully taken up. have v few useful tips sadly. although i've developed a habit of using small recurring bits of time (e.g., waiting for kettle to boil and/or tea to steep) to get through whatever can be dealt with of recurring tasks - sort & recycle or file mail, put away or wash dishes, make bed, sort away clothes, put lingerie to soak/rinse/dry, etc. you can get a lot done in a short time! also i'm sure others have mentioned unfuck your habitat - ?
I'm pretty sure it's this:
or if I'd always just grow to fit the size of the fishbowl
because of this:
Clutter is the result of children.
Kids are messy, untidy, chaotic; and they bring stuff home almost every other day. Give them more space, and they'll just fill it with more of their stuff...
"should I give it away, donate it, recycle it, etc. . . ."
Well, part of what I learned from the citizen oversight of the recycling and solid waste department is that most recycled stuff goes to the landfill anyway. If it isn't clean glass, metal or heavy cardboard, it is actually trash that we weave an elaborate fantasy about first. So I don't agonize over the trash/recycle division. Sure. I put stuff out in front of the house for passersby and might save up some stuff to put in the driveway and list on Craigslist for giveaway. But it only gets a few days of effort before it goes to the landfill.
if you get rid of something that you associate with someone you love...
Are you basically fine with someone who got rid of something associated with you? 'Cause you've lived through the experience and are nevertheless fine and thriving and you still have your relationship with that person.
A lot more directly and rudely? I'd say that level of attachment is an intrusive thought that is keeping you from living the (less cluttered) life you want. I would, for real, work on that with a shrink who does EMDR or CBT. Because you do know that holding on to that knickknack isn't keeping them alive or saving you from loss and having that object won't keep you from missing the person. And it would be better for you to separate those things and deal with the object however you want and still have the relationship you are going to have with the person.
FWIW, I would not have dealt with the barometer that way and I hope you can recover it. Beloved objects are beloved.
Yeah, Steady's brought in a volume of stuff that distresses me. But I do love the unholy joy of getting rid of the stuff from a couple years ago. The feeling of the last stroller going out to the curb? That was amazing.
I'm far from perfect about this. When I moved a year ago, I was aghast at the amount of stuff I hadn't purged.
Oh yeah. Another life joy for me is when the criteria change and I can get rid of a whole class of materials.
I would, for real, work on that with a shrink who does EMDR or CBT.
I've had this thought! Not sure how to easily locate someone worthwhile. Ideally over zoom.
On kids artwork, I think 3-7 roughly seems to be the peak years for sheer quantity. Not that they don't still produce, but just not as many trees-worth. And it's easier for me to throw away their rote academic work. So thank god that is actually declining, finally.
My mom is very tidy and organized, but in this painfully slow, rigid, keep-everything-but-organize-it-meticulously way. I can't possibly maintain that kind of system, and I don't have much understanding of anything in between "rigid and meticulous", Marie Kondo, and moderate slob.
further to 56 & 59 there is a gigantesque exception for the material momento of a beloved person/relationship/event that has its own non cluttered place where it happily lives.
61: comfortably tidy encompassing both comfortableness of the end state & the effort to maintain it is where i aim, & it's by nature personal & pretty damn flexible.
57 last - moving the entire collection of playmobil & lego on to stepdaughter & her partner, to be metered out to grandson over coming years yeeeessssss!!!!!
I can't possibly maintain that kind of system,
Heebie, you really need to Marie-Kondo the hell out of all of that excess stuff. No guilt!! If it doesn't "spark joy," if it doesn't serve an obvious utilitarian purpose, out the door it goes!...
Or just get used to living in clutter. That's mostly what we did. Just the living room is clear.
I would never actually tell people the advice in 63; if they're comfortable in clutter, that is great. But Heebie is saying she isn't actually enjoying it but not successfully clearing it out. There's also a wide range between cluttered and Kondo'd. I've never Kondo'd and myself think that "spark joy" is a super high criteria for keeping. I do fantasize about a full Kondo, but I'm just not in a position to follow through.
The other thing I did, which I hope will not spark the stupidest debate over Marie Kondo, was get rid of any books I wasn't going back to. I really pared back my bookshelves to the books I do re-read and that feels fantastic too. It is so much truer to who I am now. So much of it was just there to show that I was smart. But I'm not re-reading all those single-topic nonfiction books. Or books I was assigned in college. I only go back to a few fun or sweet fiction books and that's what I kept.
(I always have books from the library in the house. I do not have to store books to have them available to read. I do have to constantly return and request more.)
I assumed that "spark joy" was a pot reference, but I've never seen the show
I assumed that "spark joy" was a pot reference
It's like you don't even watch HGTV...
My dream is that someday our two-car garage will have room enough for two cars.
My dream is to have room in our one car garage for two cars. I've heard that if a car approaches the speed of light it gets shorter.
The trick is parking without hitting the back wall.
You'll need to hang two tennis balls from strings to the ceiling.
Heebie, re your feelings about Stuff, I just ran across "Unwanted Corkpull", by Kelly Pendergast.
Shoot. We didn't know and sent her another one for Christmas.
72: Oh man. She's a brainier version of where I'm at.
Intelligence is multifactorial. You're probably smarter than her in lots of ways that aren't complaining about kitchen drawers. Don't sell yourself short.
I deeply considered all the sage advice in this thread. Then I read between the lines and decided it was worth a headache to take one of my old leftover Vyvanses and just knock out a lot of sorting in one day.
As you all wisely hinted for me to do.
I don't know what everyone else was hinting at, but I thought I was suggesting you drop some shrooms and sort stuff.
That's why your house is all cluttered up with wisdom.
It truly looks like a wisdom bomb of mostly Christmas toys from where I'm sitting. So many legos, so many pokemon cards, everywhere.
The real Pokemon are the ones you catch along the way with your phone.
There's much better electric types.
Speaking of predictions, back in the 1990s I would never have imagined that Pokemon cards would still be a thing in 2021.
72 is very good.
This year we're doing Christmas on New Years, because that's when my family of origin can be together. Every year, we have a gift exchange extravaganza, which is ridiculous, because no one of us siblings have any children, and we're all well-paid adults who can and do buy ourselves whatever we want or need throughout the year. Also, we all have very particular tastes. Because the range of gifts we desire is very narrow, we historically each make a wish list of gifts for the others to fulfill. But even this is so, so wasteful and stupid. I just don't, at any given time, have a list of five things that I want (I mean, it would always be welcome for someone to wash and fuel my car, but that' s not the kind of thing we're supposed to ask for). So my list often ends up being mostly things I don't even actually want, things that then hang around my house and burden me with their cost and bulk and giftiness. Also, my sister (honestly my sister is primarily to blame for this entire state of affairs) frequently buys me not exactly what's on the list, but something similar but more expensive, which is SO MADDENING, because I inevitably don't like it AND I feel extra guilty when I donate or throw it away. (She also wraps everything beautifully, in extravagant wrapping paper, sometimes COVERED IN GLITTER, which then of course works its way into everything, my clothes, my hair, past my blood-brain barrier. It's like Christmas is her special time to torture me with her niceness.)
EVERY YEAR I ask my family if we can do something different. No gifts? A secret Santa where we each give and receive one gift? Edible gifts only? Finally this year my sister conceded that we could do "small" gifts, and absolved us from preparing lists. I bought everyone an earthquake preparedness kit. We will see Saturday whether she has been able to restrain herself. I'm not hopeful.
Jammies family is not that extreme - that would drive me batty - but they do do specific links for gifts. It kind of drives me crazy when it comes to the kids. The kids sit down at the computer and browse and create a dream wishlist of links, then we have to go through it and farm it out to various family members. I don't want to have this much control over the process. Can't they just wing it sometimes, and get kids something they didn't expect, and maybe hate, or maybe love?
I am expected to come up with only one thing for myself, but I usually resort to a gift certificate, which is genuinely what I'd like most, anyway.