(This post should have gone up yesterday, but I never finished it. Lazy summer.)
So it's here. The first official day of summer vacation. I've never been so happy for a school year to end.
I'm spending the first day of vacation decluttering. Lame, I know. But if I set the bar low, every other day will seem ever more fun, right? (That's my story and I'm sticking to it.)
My LONG-OVERDUE decluttering project started out as a hunt for a lost toy. I still haven't found the toy, but I found several missing shoes and managed to amass a huge pile of things that can be donated and another smaller pile of things to thrown away.
It feels great. I've been feeling like the walls have been closing in around me lately.
We looked at a house for sale Sunday. It has the rare combination of being large, affordable AND in our neighborhood. And two (TWO!) offices. His and hers. But for various other reasons, the layout doesn't really work for our family. Which is good because we realized later in the day (after 3 minor explosions) that we have a serious electrical problem in our dining room. Now we have no electricity in there and a large hole in the ceiling. A new house sounds great, but selling this one? Not so much.
So ANYWAY, I never really got my groove on this school year. I felt disorganized and scattered. I kept forgetting forms and lunches and checking homework. It just got worse as the year progressed with papers everywhere and no sense of planning ahead.
I need to make some changes this summer. I'm not sure exactly what, but I need to work on refining (ok, let's be honest), SCRAPPING AND RECREATING an entirely new system.
I need a different calendar. A more complex filing system. An office, even just one, would be lovely. Sigh. My "office" is the dining room. Which is also where we eat. So when it's time for dinner, everything on the table gets gathered up and thrown somewhere, never to be sorted again - because there's always a new avalanche of papers to take it's place.
A drastic purging was long overdue. And I have to say, it feels great. Like a fresh start. One of the things I have always missed about college, was getting to start over every semester. No matter how disorganized or behind you were the previous semester, once you walked out of your last exam it was all over. And you could completely re-invent yourself for the next one.
Now that our lives are ruled by the school calendar more than anything else, I have a glimmer of that hope for re-invention again.
4 comments:
Man, I hear you about the need for new beginnings!! I love that about school years, and I'm feeling the call to declutter, as well. First though, we have to tear a gazillion holes in all our walls to replace all the pipes, and then install new flooring on the main level, and since we're at, why not make the loan for a little more and replace all the gross old carpeting in the house, too??
Can I come hang out at your house when you're all reorganized, because I think ours is going to be a complete disaster for months!!
If you find a surefire organization strategy, don't be shy--share it! Ugh. I only have TWO kids and we're never on top of thing (AND we have a table adjacent to the dining room table! so maintaining organized piles should be easy! right?)
And YES--that was great about college, how you could just throw everything away and start over.
Awesome post!
As much as I hated school, I always loved being able to start fresh each semester with new pens and a blank notebook.
I feel the need to do a whole-house purge/reorganization project, but I don't feel right about starting it until all the other regular cleaning/laundry/regular maintenence is caught up. Which is never.
You've given me a glimmer of hope, though. Thanks. :)
Ima do that right after I complete the quarterly mopping of my kitchen floor, which I have yet to work into my schedule, and for which I am unwilling to sacrifice sleep. *sigh*
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