I woke up this morning and lay in my bed looking around my room. I have stacks of books and papers everywhere. There are boxes with Christmas gifts sitting next to my bed because there is no place for them in our tiny house. In the corner are two knitting baskets, filled with wool and needles, some from college which was a very, very long time ago. I have a tote bag filled with scarves and wraps sitting on a chair and all of Halloween in giant orange plastic bins ready to be swallowed up by the hole in the ceiling to the attic above. My desk is covered in books and papers and cards that I love, my leadership training materials and binders, cords from the camera and the jump sticks for the computer and a bottle of hand lotion and a tiny picture of Sophie when she was five. I am lying in bed, wondering if perhaps I'm slowly disappearing whether I'm a potential hoarder although when I discuss this one hour later on the phone with my best friend she tells me that hoarders have toilet paper smeared with feces that they can't throw away and I'm nowhere near that so I'm relieved but still there's all this stuff and I love it all, I do.
Mmmm. I'm not sure that's the definition of hoarder.
ReplyDeleteBut can't you just be a cherisher? That sounds so much better.
I like to think of it all as layers of nostalgia.
ReplyDeleteI would enjoy your house - and not feel so messy as I think I might be.
ReplyDeleteI like clutter ... I think it's from growing up in the austerity house. And my Dad who's more like me than his spartan spouse(s) loves coming over to my house and just relaxing - he says it's so "homey." I say, "Dad, it's just the clutter."
I wish I liked clutter more. Sometimes it makes me feel like I'm not enough of a cherisher. (love that term)
ReplyDeleteI hear you loud and clear.
ReplyDeleteI like order, but am a piler, and do not put things away as I was taught to do. There are little piles of my stuff all over our house...Gregg does not do this; David does. It makes the thought of ever moving from here a tad overwhelming.
Damn, I must be a hoarder. Oh, wait, does it count if it is Pearlsky's very first diaper?
ReplyDeleteI know a real hoarder, and believe me, it ain't what you're describing. No, no saved toilet paper. But you can't walk through the house, you have to climb!
ReplyDeleteI have lived in some places where it was great fun to peel away layers of history, like an old house in San Francisco where there were layers of linoleum with newspapers in between, first dating back to around 1950, then the late 30's, and then all the way back to 1910. The wallpaper was similarly fascinating, layers and layers that would have looked very nice partly torn so you could glimpse all of them, and preserved that way.
I once knew a woman whose house was literally filled with walls of magazines and newspapers. You walked through them from room to room, like following a maze. It was a trip. You're nowhere near that. But you are funny. I like the term "cherisher" too.
ReplyDeleteUgh. I have serious issues with STUFF. I have entirely too much stuff. I am definitely close to being a hoarder, although the house is clean enough. There is just stuff everywhere. It's as if any flat surface calls to me ... "Pile crap on me". I do like Ms. Moon's suggestion that we be called Cherishers instead! :)
ReplyDeleteI love your writing, I do. xo
ReplyDeleteWe seem to walk similar paths at the very same time from dentists to hoarding ponderings which I have been doing a lot of for 2 weeks now. After watching a few episodes of Hoarders on Netflix I have come to the realization that I am not mentally ill which true hoarders are. You are an artist and thinker. All artists and thinkers have trophy's. BTW I'm having a yard sale on Friday :)
ReplyDeleteI know exactly what you mean. I should send you a picture of my desk. I think it's genetic. Isn't it?
ReplyDeleteMy mom's a hoarder and I cycle through gathering and purging. I like stuff. I'm thrifty. I need things. And kids require lots of paper piles, they just do. So does life for that matter. I am the keeper of all things for this family, including mementos and memories so I struggle every day. I think paper clutter is the hardest though, and ew to the unflushed toilet paper! I haven't seen that one yet on the show Hoarders, but dead pests and pets seem to be a common theme with the worst of them. I think we're OK so far, don't you? :)
ReplyDeleteI thought I was a hoarder too until I read the definition your best friend gave you:)!
ReplyDelete