In my small flat I am blessed with several large cupboards. I sometimes wonder if were the cupboards removed, would I have enough space to create a new room, but they’re not located in positions that would allow that. There are three cupboards in the hallway. Perhaps once a year I pull everything out of each cupboard, discard things, clean the floor and shelves and re-establish the sites as organised, nifty, with room to spare. I remind myself I have the holy grail of a small home: storage! I’m liberated because storage!
Then ever so slowly, chaos creeps in. I find myself stuffing odd items into precarious places – the empty packaging from a ring light I might resell has been squeezed into an uneven gap between a pile of printing paper and a wedge of bubble wrap. My systems (this box for small electrical items and cables, this box for spare lightbulbs, this folder for nice cards and ribbons, this cupboard for cat supplies) go badly awry. The cupboard is transformed from a pleasing, near-smug place to a site of shame and sometimes fear. We are at this place right now.
In the cupboard I use for my suitcases, hoover, coats and a giant stuffed Totoro toy, I’ve allowed a strange forest floor of random things that have fallen from their official home to emerge. There’s a squished toilet roll. A small bag of clothing ‘for the charity shop’. Some cables. Parts for my pressure washer that I didn’t place securely onto their fixings. There may even be things like nice scarves or bags that I’ve irreparably damaged through this neglect. And where there is debris like this, there is likely some unwanted insect life. I will need to put on my rubber gloves and drag out all these things into the hall, primed for something that will make me scream. Why do I let things get into this state, I ask myself? Each time I perform an audit and restacking of the cupboard I tell myself – I won’t allow this to happen again! I will be orderly and maintain a tight ship! I will get the best out of my storage, show it some goddamn respect! But as with things you can close a door on, literally or metaphorically, I start well and then become lax and finally, avoidant. I don’t want to deal with it.
A couple of weekends ago, in preparation for winter, I investigated the state of my knitwear. I thought I’d taken sufficient precautions, but moths got to most of my favs. A charity shop cardigan in orange wool with deep patch pockets. A spenny black cashmere jumper from Cos I bought last year as ‘an investment’. My faithful Whistles funnel neck jumpers that I wear for work each day in the winter. I sealed them back up in their plastic bags and told myself I’d work out a salvage plan. Then I was prepping for a book event and thought I’d take my Gucci shoes, my dependable six-year-old black Gucci shoes that I decided to wear to their death to justify their purchase. And opening the box, I discovered they had a fine fuzz of white mould on them, and I realised with despair that I’d put them in the box last when they were a little damp from wearing them in the rain. I’m destroying what I love! I wailed to myself. I took them outside and brushed off the mould and then dried them with my hairdryer. They look fine now. But I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to forget seeing them with this peach-fuzz of decay.
It’s not just my things I do this to. I look in the mirror and think, ahh you bought that SPF for decades, but you did not apply that SPF and now you have age spots and wrinkles. All these things you can’t notice until the damage is done. I feel sometimes living is digging yourself out of a hole, experiencing the bright relief of being on the surface again, and then slowly sinking into that hole until you must dig your way out again. How you doing? people ask. I’m objectively fine I say, but I don’t feel fine at all. Overwhelm has made itself evident in my material world. My coping mechanisms have indicated their malfunction by disordering what was once ordered. My coping mechanisms are screeching at me: pay attention! I’m going to put it all right where you can see it.
Yesterday, I noticed, as I have done for several months now, that my windows were very unclean. Cobwebs on the outer panes. Smudges and grime on the inner ones. Do it now! I told myself. So, I cleaned the windows, in and out. I cleaned them until the glass became invisible. Now there’s a contrast – the optimistic, clean windows and the grotty skirting boards. One task hides another. I draw up a list. Add ‘clean the windows’ to it and immediately tick it off.
“I feel sometimes living is digging yourself out of a hole, experiencing the bright relief of being on the surface again, and then slowly sinking into that hole until you must dig your way out again.” VERY THIS.
You have just described me! I recently shamed myself into gathering items that I don’t plan to use again from my closets and shelves. I set up tables in my garage and carried out extra dishes, linens, decor, etc. and placed them on the tables. Then 3 family members became very ill and I, myself, was in the middle of 6 weeks of physical therapy for an injury. Now, a full month later, I’ve done nothing more with the items awaiting me in my garage. My intentions to box up items for donation or sale are still strong--it just may take awhile.