My attempts to tidy, de-clutter and chuck stuff out

I would have liked to report that my attempts to tidy, de-clutter and chuck stuff out, to recycle or dispose of were going well and that I can already see a great improvement and feel lighter and positive… However… There are a couple of dozen not very good photos and a several newspaper and magazine cuttings in the paper recycling, there are a few items from the kitchen ready to go to the charity shop, ditto clothes, plus some clothes I hope might be sold – and apart from that I haven’t really changed very much at all. If you came to visit you’d be welcomed in with a cup of tea or coffee or anything else but you’d look around and think “what an interesting home” and by interesting you would mean chaotic and untidy. Untidy?? I’ve spent all day tidying up!!!

I guess my problem with possessions – clothes, household items, books, photographs, things I’ve written – is that I am too attached to them, they trigger such memories of people and places and things I’ve done, as well as having the foolish idea that one day whatever it is might come in useful. No, no, no it won’t come in useful – and if I need a cheese grater I will use the one I’ve always used, not the other one which I thought might be better, or the other other one I got because I’d misplaced the original one. No I don’t need so much crockery – there are only two of us living here  (our son is in temporary residence but hopes to depart soon) we no longer have visitors or friends round for meals as these days it’s more of a thing to go out to celebrate etc! No I don’t need all those in-date food items which are unbreached and untouched because we don’t like them and would be perfectly suitable to be donated to a food bank. No I don’t need copies of paper books which I also have on my Kindle – and these days only e-read!

Husband meanwhile, has been paying attention to my attempts and he has been through his wardrobe and drawers and there is a pile of trousers, shorts, shirts, t-shirts, folded, bagged and ready to go to a charity shop. He is feeling very smug. I, on the other hand, am looking round my little writing room, at the piles of books, boxes, bags, folders and files and wondering why I still have so many and so much.

I’ll have to think like Scarlett O’Hara,‘tomorrow is another day…’