Flip-Flops and Home Sales
The summer after I gave birth to the baby, I treated myself to a new swimsuit. It was one of those forgiving tankini styles in black, with strategically placed blue ruffles. Dillard's was having a special sale, so I got some free gifts with my purchase -- a set of cheap flip-flops two sizes too big and a pair of ugly plastic sunglasses. I knew I would never use either but felt guilty throwing away items that were perfectly good, so I left the items in a bag on my bedroom floor until I decided what to with them.
That was in 2013.
One entire presidential term came and went while that bag sat on my floor. (Thanks, Obama.)
I am not a good housekeeper. Clutter tends to follow in my wake, from winter shoes I may need to wear tomorrow to bills I need to sort through to toys I should give away. And when I begin to feel overwhelmed by raising two tiny, needful humans and living through a time of deep political unrest that may affect my family's sole income stream, my housekeeping gets worse.
Studies have repeatedly shown a clear link between clutter (or, in its worst state, hoarding) and depression. It's a cycle -- when we get depressed we stop taking care of ourselves and neglect our homes, and when things begin to pile up we get stressed out and paralyzed and then more depressed. This is what happens to me. To borrow a phrase from a 1990s Jewel song, my standard of living gets stuck on survive. I'm not in literal danger of death, but I'm focusing on getting through the next hours or weeks however I can. That means paring my to-do list to the bare minimum of keeping the kids fed and the house livable. I don't have the energy or ambition to dust the top of the dresser or vacuum the carpet. Things get away from me.
Things like flip-flops on my bedroom floor and the entirety of our home office, which somehow became the catch-all room for things like painting drop cloths, old comic books, leftover party supplies, a lamp the kids broke, and one plastic Cozy Coupe.
I am grateful to have a gracious husband who is not a neat freak and recognizes when I am struggling. He does not judge the dirt under the foyer rug or make snide comments about the ring around the kids' bath tub. (I maintain that this helps him know how high the water in the tub should be.) So the flip-flops and sunglasses and dust and Cozy Coupe weren't really an issue. Until we decided to move.
Because when you're already feeling overwhelmed with all of your responsibilities and the state of life, what's better than putting your current home up for sale while simultaneously building a new one?
It started innocently enough. I made a comment to my husband about how I'd rather burn the house down than try to redecorate and reorganize the home we've shared for a decade, back when red dining rooms and honey oak cabinets were all the rage. I laughed, he laughed, the microwave laughed (right, Kellyanne?), and we all went on with our lives. Secretly, though, each of us started thinking about moving. Not so much because of our extra stuff and our burnt-orange kitchen walls, but because we had been talking for years about wanting a little more space and a bigger yard in a smaller neighborhood. Less than a month later, we had signed a contract on a home to be finished in the summer. Suddenly, I had a reason to get myself moving and get the house in Mary Poppins condition.
I've spent an alarming number of hours since then cleaning and de-cluttering and paring down storage just to get to the point where most of you already are. Those of you who don't suffer from clutter, anyway.
And this is on top of still raising the two tiny humans and still waking up and reading the latest presidential tweets every day.
I realize, ruefully, that this exhaustion is my own fault. If I hadn't let the housekeeping go for so long, I wouldn't have needed to spend so much time catching up. It seems to have paid off, though, because after four days on the market our house was under contract to be sold. I firmly believe this has nothing to do with luck or supply and demand and everything to do with my cleaning and de-cluttering abilities.
In other news, our new neighborhood will have a pool and that means I'll have to get another swimsuit. This time I'm going to pass on the gift with purchase. I call that progress.
That was in 2013.
One entire presidential term came and went while that bag sat on my floor. (Thanks, Obama.)
I am not a good housekeeper. Clutter tends to follow in my wake, from winter shoes I may need to wear tomorrow to bills I need to sort through to toys I should give away. And when I begin to feel overwhelmed by raising two tiny, needful humans and living through a time of deep political unrest that may affect my family's sole income stream, my housekeeping gets worse.
Studies have repeatedly shown a clear link between clutter (or, in its worst state, hoarding) and depression. It's a cycle -- when we get depressed we stop taking care of ourselves and neglect our homes, and when things begin to pile up we get stressed out and paralyzed and then more depressed. This is what happens to me. To borrow a phrase from a 1990s Jewel song, my standard of living gets stuck on survive. I'm not in literal danger of death, but I'm focusing on getting through the next hours or weeks however I can. That means paring my to-do list to the bare minimum of keeping the kids fed and the house livable. I don't have the energy or ambition to dust the top of the dresser or vacuum the carpet. Things get away from me.
Things like flip-flops on my bedroom floor and the entirety of our home office, which somehow became the catch-all room for things like painting drop cloths, old comic books, leftover party supplies, a lamp the kids broke, and one plastic Cozy Coupe.
 |
| I don't know how this happened. |
I am grateful to have a gracious husband who is not a neat freak and recognizes when I am struggling. He does not judge the dirt under the foyer rug or make snide comments about the ring around the kids' bath tub. (I maintain that this helps him know how high the water in the tub should be.) So the flip-flops and sunglasses and dust and Cozy Coupe weren't really an issue. Until we decided to move.
Because when you're already feeling overwhelmed with all of your responsibilities and the state of life, what's better than putting your current home up for sale while simultaneously building a new one?
It started innocently enough. I made a comment to my husband about how I'd rather burn the house down than try to redecorate and reorganize the home we've shared for a decade, back when red dining rooms and honey oak cabinets were all the rage. I laughed, he laughed, the microwave laughed (right, Kellyanne?), and we all went on with our lives. Secretly, though, each of us started thinking about moving. Not so much because of our extra stuff and our burnt-orange kitchen walls, but because we had been talking for years about wanting a little more space and a bigger yard in a smaller neighborhood. Less than a month later, we had signed a contract on a home to be finished in the summer. Suddenly, I had a reason to get myself moving and get the house in Mary Poppins condition.
I've spent an alarming number of hours since then cleaning and de-cluttering and paring down storage just to get to the point where most of you already are. Those of you who don't suffer from clutter, anyway.
 |
| The office does exist. |
And this is on top of still raising the two tiny humans and still waking up and reading the latest presidential tweets every day.
I realize, ruefully, that this exhaustion is my own fault. If I hadn't let the housekeeping go for so long, I wouldn't have needed to spend so much time catching up. It seems to have paid off, though, because after four days on the market our house was under contract to be sold. I firmly believe this has nothing to do with luck or supply and demand and everything to do with my cleaning and de-cluttering abilities.
In other news, our new neighborhood will have a pool and that means I'll have to get another swimsuit. This time I'm going to pass on the gift with purchase. I call that progress.
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