apartment therapy: week 2

Week 2 of apartment therapy is winding down, and I'm remembering all of my organizational skills. I'd forgotten how much I like doing that -- I've been cleaning like crazy, which isn't my favorite thing, but I've also been purging, throwing away so many things. Today I got rid of a lot of costume jewelery that I've been saving for no good reason. I've been throwing out several year old lip balms, socks that have no partners, bits and pieces of furniture that I've put together, random odds and ends. It's interesting what I choose to keep, too. Why can't I part with the few pairs of underwear that are getting holes in them or have stretched out so that they no longer even stay up? What makes me hang on to all of my bottles of perfume that I haven't touched in probably a year and a half or more? Why can't I part with books I have no interest in?

I love the feeling of using up things that I have. Most of my adult years have been a long consumer binge, accumulating things to comfort myself, to make up for the lack of things I felt I had when I was younger. I felt like a child when I moved down to Louisiana because I had so few things. Most of my things are cheap too, IKEA, a particleboard bed with drawers, TV stands, and desks I've put together. The things I keep are older, metal, glass. Very little plastic.

My apartment has been feeling lighter, more free lately. Sometimes I get worried that I might go overboard and binge on purging so that my apartment (and my life) becomes too spartan, too boring. New blank spaces on walls sometimes frighten me, there's too much change! But then I open my wardrobe and see sheets bulging out of my trunk, pieces of a cordless phone dripping over the wire-framed shelf, the ghosts of shopping trips past. And I make decisions: I throw it a away, give it away, sell it, or--most excitingly-- find new uses for things I've never used, or use something already in use differently. If I don't like something, I can always change it back. For some reason, I always forget that.

Somehow, cleaning and organizing and throwing things away has always been linked with writing for me. Last weekend, I worked on what I'm calling my fake novel for a bit, but it wasn't a very stationary endeavor. It all started when I was doing dishes -- I got this idea of something I wanted to add to my fake novel -- just a few lines. So I did. Then I got up again and did a few more dishes, and while I was doing that, I thought of some more things I could write about, and so I did. This went on just for a bit and felt cleansing and pure and good.

Organizing and cleaning out my house has always helped me organize and clean out my mind. As I sort through the dusty clutter of my house, something deep inside me shifts as well. I feel free, light, energetic. I worry, though, about getting too clean, about having too much organization and cleanliness. I need a little of the mess to stay with me.