Tuesday, September 12, 2006

Dejunking and the domestic environment.

Now that Mairi is at school full time, I have six...read it again, SIX hours a day four days a week without her. Plus Friday mornings. Freedom......You might think that I`m having a grand time with all this spare time? Weeelll...sort of. As I`ve said before, the major building repairs start in October. So I`m trying to get ahead of myself with tidying up the house, and getting rid of any unneccesary junk.

Of which we have a lot. A LOT. We`ve been here for eight years, and most of these have been troubled times, what with Robbie`s illness and death, and the aftermath. Keeping a neat, tidy and clutter free house has not been much of a priority....I`m not one of these strange people that gain solace from scrubbing things. I prefer to go to the allotment. So over the past years the junk has rather taken over.

I`m not talking about the hobby stuff...no, that`s not junk, though goodness knows there`s enough of that too! But you know how it is...you buy something new, but do you get rid of the old one? Not if you`re me. You put it in a cupboard because "It might come in handy if the old one breaks". Well and good, but once you`ve done this three or four times, you forget that you had the original one in the first place, don`t you? And if the current one does break (none of them have ever broken, btw,)then would you use the old one? Well perhaps...for as long as it took to go out and buy a new one.

This makes me sound like the consumer slut from hell, doesn`t it? With cupboards bursting with barely used appliances etc? Nothing so interesting sadly. But things like worn out linen, cooking utensils, elderly pots and pans...they all seem to breed in my cupboards. It doesn`t help that when my late sister in law died I ended up with all her vastly superior kitchen equipment....but didn`t throw my own out.

And multiply that for the whole house, and every possible type of item you can think of.

I have a problem, don`t I..........?????????

Anyway, a combination of the upcoming building works and time to do something about it has focussed my attention on this problem. I don`t want to be moving all this junk out of the way of the workies...and then move it all back into the cupboards again, do I? So...I`m dejunking. Charity shops, recycling, the dump, unwilling friends and Ebay. The target I set myself was at least one 80 litre binbag a day. This is easy, btw...some days I`m managing three or four. So over the course of the last month, I figure I`ve cleared out.....60 bags?

SO WHY IS IT THE HOUSE LOOKS NO DIFFERENT?????????????????

8 comments:

Wye Sue said...

Well Done for starting the clear out. If it makes you feel better when I moved I had 70 boxes, not bad for someone who lives alone and was in a small cottage....
Now I'm in a bigger house I dread to think how many boxes I'd fill.. Think my craft and book obsessions have got out of hand ...
Carry on clearing and if you need a hand with short decorating give me a yell ;-)

rho said...

I so understand what you are saying - We have our household stuff -- stuff from the house I grew up in when my dad died and stuff from my Aunts home in Arizona from after she died -- plus all our STUFF. I have stuff up to my ears I swear -- I am getting to the point where a big dumpster sounds about right to me. Keep writing about your experience and maybe it will give me the needed push. :D

Spinningsue said...

Aaah! That would be the re-clutter pixies. The little buggers!

gourdongirl said...

If I leave you my keys the next time I'm round for coffee, could you go to chez gourdongirl and de-clutter there too? Coz I seriously need to de-clutter too!!!!

PURLPOWER said...

Have you tried using Freecycle?

It's a brilliant way to avoid having to take things you can't sell to the tip. People even come and pick the stuff up rather than you having to take it anywhere!

Not sure which is your nearest branch so I'll give you the UK list and you can pick your nearest one to join:
http://www.freecycle.org/display.php?region=United%20Kingdom

Robin said...

de-cluttering???? What's that??
Let's start a new "Pack Rat's" club!

Spinningfishwife said...

PurlPower (I`ve got no email link for you!!)

I`ve got a local Freecycle, yup. I`ve got rid of quite a lot of things through it over the years...never got anything out of it though. (Probably just as well....) Thing is, I don`t like to put anything too manky on for offer, and some of my junk is just plain embarrassing....

Our local Council is pretty good for recycling, though...it doesn`t just go into the one skip. You can sort your junk into all sorts of nice catagories first, and there`s a homeless charity that has a shipping container at the dump...excuse me, recycling area.... that takes all sorts of sellable items. Very convenient. I`m waiting impatiently for my new(ish) car to arrive though so I can get rid of last weeks pile of bags....

PURLPOWER said...

Your dump, sorry 'recycling centre' sounds very civilised, round our way people leave their embarrassing manky junk in the back alley, usually right next to my back door. Sigh.

Glad to hear you are already on the freecycle buzz, got to keep spreading the word.