Siggy's Blurbs: Siggy's Edge of Country …

Sometimes I have to focus on something else other than me. I was depressed and made a list of what was getting me down and shared it with my wife. Top of my list was sorting through several hundred records, determining what to keep and then organizing and storing them in some fashion so I could find them. For months I was looking at several piles of them that were placed on top of the bookcase and other places and the clutter had me depressed. I did not know what to do with them. My wife and I discussed places where we could store them in an organized way if we just cleared these spots in the living room. I was thrilled: now I had a way to organize the LP’s I wanted to keep. Yesterday I spent several hours going through these albums. Later on I realized my depression had left. I had focused on something other than me. And another benefit of the list was my wife worked on one thing that was also depressing me. It was a room we had once called the junk room and was now mostly empty. There was no progress being made there. She starting chipping away at it. It looks like that one day we might have a guest room. Once it is completely empty we will paint and furnish it. I was thrilled at the progress she had made in a few days. These were two majors things that had been bothering me. All of a sudden I had hope. And most of my depression left.

Tags: clutter, depression, focus on something else, guest room, hope, junk room, LP's, made a list, making progress, my wife, record albums, several hundred records
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Just give it away.  There are so many things in our house that neither of us have even handled the last year.  The things are just sitting there.  Maybe, there is someone out there who can use the item.  Maybe, I will start a “clutter” journal.  So many times we discussed things we wanted to go through, discard or give away and I forget the agreements we made regarding those items we discussed.  Maybe if we wrote them down I can refer to the journal which can act as a contract between my wife and I.  We will see.  I will run that by my wife.

Tags: clutter, clutter journal, discard, give away, give it away, maybe someone can use them, my wife, so many things
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We don’t need extras of this and that.  We don’t need backup printers or computers so old they run on dos.  And that is old.  We can rely that God will provide for our needs.  And when we need it.  I am tired of this clutter.  And things we just don’t need.  I keep coming back to what will happen when we both go.  Most of the stuff will just be trashed that we held on so dearly. I still remember how hard and time consuming it was to go through my wife’s deceased Mom’s stuff.  We don’t have to stock pile.  It is just not necessary.

Tags: clutter, don't have to stock pile, God, God will provide for our needs, rely on God, stuff, things we don't need, tired of clutter, we don't need extras, what will happen when we go
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I was depressed about the clutter in this house.  There were too many books, VCRs and LPs and I did not know where to start.  I know we have made some headway but not enough.  I can’t just get rid of stuff:  I have to run it by my “other”.  I really do not know where to start.  I was down to begin with and when I look around at the clutter I just got more depressed.  The house is out of control.  I don’t know where to start or do this mutually.  I need someone to come in and aid us in this process.  We have had one room we call a junk room.  We want it to be a guest room but it feels like it will never be cleared.  I step in it and I just shake my head.  I just don’t know what to do any longer.

Tags: clutter, depressed about clutter, depression, don't know what to do, don't know where to start, get rid of stuff, guest room, house is out of control, junk room, LP's, my wife, too many books, VCRs
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It is only a room yet…  It seems as if we had talked about converting it to a guest room forever.  The room had been referred to as a ‘junk’ room.  It is extremely cluttered.  And every time I look inside that room I despair.  We will never straighten it up or so it seems.  It would take a miracle.  Or so it seems.  I do not know why it is so hard to get rid of things but it is.  Greater miracles have happened in my life so maybe one day that room will become a guest room.  We will see.

Tags: clutter, despair, getting rid of things, guest room, junk room, miracles
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We have too many things in our house.  And that has me depressed.  I want greater order in our house.  I don’t know how to get there.

There are too many books, too much music particularly LP’s, too many knickknacks, electronic, computer and stereo equipment.  Some of it is broken down and other equipment is obsolete.

I just want to throw away some stuff, give it away, whatever.  Some of it is not mine.  It belongs to my wife.  I don’t know how to straighten up our house.  I am surrounded by things.

I just want to throw up my hands.  I don’t know where to start.  It is driving me crazy.  The disorder that is.  I want to say “abracadabra” and wake up and most of the stuff is gone.  I just don’t know what to do.

Tags: abracadabra, books, broken down, clutter, depressed, disorder, driving me crazy, electronics, give away stuff, knickknacks, LP's, music, my wife, obsolete, records, stereo equipment, straighten up the house, surrounded by things, throw away stuff, throw up my hands, too many things, too much stuff, want order in our house
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We have the same fight over and over:  it is about things.  I want less to enter the house.  She is, again, active on “Free Cycle”, a web site where people give things away.  The theory is for less to end up in land fills.

Yesterday, she came home with a scanner and some other things we did not need.  It does me no good to tell her I do not want that item.  She gets seduced by things.  She even admits that.

I have been after her to gather documentation for her deceased husband’s pension. (She is the beneficiary.)  The documents she needs are probably in our “junk room.”

I could not believe it among some books piled in one corner of the house falls out her first marriage certificate–over thirty years old the document was.  It was in tatters to give you some idea of the disorder in this house.

A friend months ago came over and made some order out of our “junk” room.  Unfortunately after that she kept putting more stuff in there.

Actually it was me. She kept getting more things and I did not want to “junk” up the living room.  I had to put the stuff somewhere.

And it is true as she said the junk room is no longer neat and it is hard again to walk in that room.  There is so much stuff in there.  She does not want to search for her documents until the room is neater and she could walk around in it.

All this despite the fact the new stuff (since the room was straightened out) was obtained by her.  There is old computers (even ones that run on DOS), extra printers, broken down stereo equipment, books etc.

And it is true I am not as neat as her but she is the pack rat and stuff keeps entering our house whether or not we need them and all I want to do is tear out my hair.  And we periodically keep having these fights.  About things.

Tags: books, broken stereo equipment, clutter, DOS, fight about things, Freecycle, junk room, old computers, pack rat, printers, scanner, stuff, the same fight, too many things
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I don’t know how to extricate myself from my things.  I feel trapped by them.  I have too many LPs, books in particular.  That is only a short list.

Being married makes it a little harder.  Some of the things are hers or ours.  There are still many books and cassettes in boxes as well.  I just want order and don’t know how to get there.

My house is budging (??bulging??) at its seams.  I tell my wife someone is going to have the mammoth job of going through our stuff when we are gone but that does not make any difference to her.

We had made three trips to Austin to finish the job of going through her Mom’s stuff.  Too much of it is still in boxes in the basement.  It costs us a small fortune to ship that stuff.

I just don’t know how to downsize.  We have a junk room upstairs.  It could be a guest room if it was ever cleared.  All this is driving me crazy.

I just want to throw away, give away stuff.  I want more order in this house.  Pray for me.  I don’t know what else to do.

Tags: books, boxes of stuff, cassettes, clutter, downsize, guest room, junk room, LP's, my wife, order in the house, pray for me, record albums, stuff, throw away stuff, too many things
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Every once in awhile I think about our house and what will happen to the things in it when we are both gone. Clearing and sorting through my wife’s Moms’ stuff after she died was a major task.  In fact, we had to make three trips to Texas to accomplish to that job.

I told my wife someone one day will have to do that to us.  You can’t take your things with you when you are gone.  That fact does not make any difference to her.  More things keep coming in our house.

I look around our house and know when the time comes someone will have a major task in front of them.  And a lot of things that are here and we would not get rid of will just be trashed.

I do not want to say my wife is the only one that collects things.  I collect music–CD’s, LP’s and cassettes.  I also collect books and they are practically in every room, some still in boxes so I am part of the problem too.

I thought what might be valuable if both of us are gone and would like to pass on:  my journals, my wife’s writing which is scattered–not much.

Even the value of those am not sure I will have any say over.  From dust you come and dust you will return.  I have to remind myself of that.  And maybe consider what truly has value.

Tags: can't take it with you, cassettes, CD, clutter, collect books, death, from dust to dust, God, LP, music, my journals, my wife, stuff in our house, things in our house, what truly has value, writing
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About a year ago my other had discovered “Freecycle”.  It is a web site–worldwide–whose goal is things should not end up in landfills.  People give things away they don’t want in their house any longer.

That is admirable but for everything that left out house three things came in.  Our house is bursting with things.

The second time she got involved with “Freecycle” I felt more hopeful that ratio would change:  she got rid of a stove (we ordered a new one), some bookcases and miscellaneous items.

Then she elicited my help on the guise of, “Do you want to keep me company?”  Sometimes she does not tell me what she is picking up.  Someone was giving away boxes of medical legal books.

Had I not been with her, she would have had to make multiple trips from the second floor to put them in the back of our SUV.  She has a bad back.

She took these books despite the fact we have no extra book case room.  A previous lawyer had owned these books and what she was going to do with these books was beyond me.

The same trip she told me she was going to pick up some tile.  I envisioned a small box of tiles.  Wrong!  It was a big box full of whole and broken tiles on a dolly.

The box would have broken if you were foolhardy to attempt to lift it.  We had to transfer them into smaller boxes.  She had some kind of idea she wanted to do mosaics.  All I could do was shake my head.

The same day she picked up a Sony double cassette and a Sony 50 CD deck despite the fact we had at least two completely working cassette decks.  It made no difference I told her I did not want either.

I just have to resign myself that our house is going to be full of junk and bursting from the seams.  And there is nothing I can do to stop it.  My war on the clutter is an unending battle that I will never win and occasionally have pockets of success.

Tags: boxes of books, cassette decks, clutter, Freecycle, give things away, house full of junk, house full of things, my wife, stuff, too many things in this house, unneeded stuff, war on clutter
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Our perennial fight about stuff.  In the garage is a Hammond organ.  It is there because I did not want it in the living room.  It does not work.  I doubt anyone wants it.  My wife thinks it is worth something.  I just want to trash it.

That is the fight my wife and I have over and over–about stuff.  It is hard to get rid of any books.  Unfortunately when you have too many books the really good ones get buried.

That does not make any difference.  She insists on keeping them.  So our book shelves are bulging.

I collect music.  My wife at some point discovered E Bay and bought lots of used LPs and CDs and now my music collection is out of control.

We have fight after fight about things–too many things in our house–a lot of things that are not being used.

Is that what all couples have–issues that will not go away and can’t be resolved no matter what?

Tags: book shelves, CDs, clutter, collect music, fight about stuff, Hammond organ, issues that will not go away, LP's, music, my wife, too many books, too many things in our house, too much stuff
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Clothes are just like books.  If you have too many, you can’t find your favorite ones too easily for they are buried.  For example, I would rather have an hundred favorite books than another additional nine hundred that hide the other hundred.  In fact I did that with my office:  it has my favorite books in it.  Just a thought.

Tags: balance, books, clothes, clutter, favorite books, office, too many books, too many clothes
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