Cathartic purging

Have you ever all of a sudden looked around at your home and decided something like , "Who are you and how did you get so disgusting and horrid and I hate you and what is all this stuff and how on earth did it get here?!"

Perhaps you are much saner than I and do not talk to your house as if it were a person.  Perhaps you have never had this experience.  If you haven't, let me tell you, it is utterly consuming as it happens and the only remedy for it is to wildly, madly, immediately start throwing everything you see into the garbage.

This was my afternoon yesterday, which is why this post is a day late.  I was busy throwing my house in the garbage.

I have a lot of friends who have garage sales.  I personally have never had one because I much prefer the instant freedom of complete and crazy purging and if you were to have a garage sale, you'd have to actually save things you want to get rid of.  I cannot do this.  Once I have decided I no longer want it, I cannot have it burning its devilish eyes into me or the back of my head as I wait to send it to its new loving home.  I much prefer the ruthless attack method of plunking it down in the garbage as if I were Shaq nearly bodyslamming a dunk in a game-winning style and crying out in resolute victory.  

This tornado was born late this weekend.  On Sunday I had gone to visit a friend's house and it was so lovely and perfect and wonderful that when I arrived home to my own house, I thought I might like to fix it up by perhaps burning it to the ground and starting over. Since my husband would not let me do this (he is like, so totally bogue!), I instead began in the kitchen - looking at it if I were seeing it for the first time and looking for things that were visually cluttering my space.  I believe I may be somewhere along the lines of a minimalist at heart and think it is better to live simply - or as simply as possible.  

I am a bit forced into a more minimalistic way because of the size of my house, which was even slightly under the average house size for when it was built around 1950 (it's a whopping 950 square feet).  If you have one thing out in any room, it looks like you have a complete and total disaster going on.  If you have a book on your kitchen table, it looks like you're in shambles.  If you have a cup on a counter in the kitchen, the whole place is a giant mess.  Small spaces have to be fairly clean or you can become easily overwhelmed.  Rather, I can become easily overwhelmed.

Which is what I totally was yesterday.

Thus, the pitching began.  My husband came home and said that the kitchen was naked.  I said thanks.  It feels better that way.  The rest of the house is in line for my tornado path and I'm going to likely boost my overall average of 1/2 a bag of garbage per week to somewhere near 800 bags after I am finished.

Part of it is that when we first moved in, it was just us.  A happy couple.  No kids.  No ratty, gross, shedding, dirty dog.  No handprints on EVERY SURFACE.  No dirt on the wall (how is it POSSIBLE to even GET dirt on the walls?  Who does that?  My kids, that's who.).  No scratched up, destroyed wood floors.  Oh the floors!  They were beautiful!  They shone in the morning sunlight as if they were heavenly messengers sent from above!  Now any light shining onto them exposes dog hair and gouged out horrors.

Now at this point, some sentimental person would reflect and say the dirt was a sign of joy and life in the house.  They would fondly smile as if memories were being created in each apparent knifed-out wooden board.  They would say they would never trade all the cleanness in the world for the bewildering swirls of joy that go on in their humble abode.  

To this person, I say, "You are a mental patient who has sunk to the levels of George Costanza wearing sweat pants in public."

Duh, I wouldn't trade my kids in for anything.  I'm not saying that.  (I did, however, start making plans to get rid of my dog.)  But COME ON!  It's not peaceful in the brains if you've got a slothy, slodgy, barf house!  

Your house is a relfection of the inside of your brain and mine needs to be organized every once in a while.

Ahh.  Cathartic rants.  I feel so much better now!

Peace, love and bienvenidos, casa nueva!
Ms. Daisy