Every house has them. The kitchen junk drawer. That little space in the back of the closet. That spare dresser or end table. The little nook in the basement. Black holes. Not the astronomical ones but the household variety. We got ‘em. We got plenty of ‘em.
And somehow, eliminating those black holes have become symbolic of this next step towards total retirement. At this point, they gotta go.
Now, let’s be honest here: I’m mostly all talk. For those of you who have tackled the black holes in your lives and homes before, admit it. We make progress… for awhile. And then, somehow the slide starts again and the junk drawer fills up. That loose battery that was an extra when you bought a pack of four but needed three? It’s in the junk drawer. (Mostly to be forgotten about.) I’ve purged my closet more times than I can honestly remember. And while this last purge has stuck, that was mostly because I was getting rid of suits and dresses.
Still, I’m ready to make another run at our black holes. It feels like if I can eliminate most of them, I will be really “mostly retired.” Plus, I’m hyper focused these days on creating a home for everything. My big theory is that once I have a home for everything, those excess hours spent looking for a lost item can be better put to use drinking wine and researching vacations. (I’ve got big dreams. 😊)
But, as I enter my weekend with a clean house, groceries in the pantry, a mowed yard, clean laundry and well taken care of pets, I find myself at the best opportunity I’ve had in a long time to start eliminating the black holes. At least, that’s what I’m telling myself this Friday night while sipping a glass of red wine and relaxing before dinner prep.
It should be a no-brainer here. This weekend is absolutely wide open and while I’m certainly welcome to help my husband with one of his projects, he’s also perfectly capable of doing them himself. And then there’s the motivation. It actually MEANS something to me to get rid of the black hole. And yet… .
What’s holding me back? Ha! Have you opened that can of worms recently? It’s a jungle out there (or in here, as it may be better to say). Tackling just one of my black holes may be enough to send me straight to the wine fridge at 10 a.m. tomorrow. These things are not for the faint of heart.
So, as I’m psyching myself up to not just give up before I even get started, I’ve decided to take a lowest-hanging-fruit strategy. Literally. I’m racking my brain right now to uncover the lowest hanging fruit so that I can tackle it tomorrow. If I have to choose – and I do – I think I’m going to choose the liquor cabinet. And no, not for the reason you’re thinking.
You see, the liquor cabinet has two drawers on top. Both are packed with, well, junk. But it would be super helpful to unpack the junk, give everything in there a home and get rid of what we don’t need. And then? Well, then I can put kitty accoutrement into one of the drawers. Their flea/tick meds, extra collars and RFID tags for their feeders would be well-positioned there. Not only are they the reason I drink (just kidding), but three of the five feeders are located in that room. And let’s face it, without a kitty collar and an RFID tag programmed to the kitty, that kitty ain’t eating. So, the goal is that the next time we head out for vacation, each cat will have a spare programmed RFID tag along with a spare collar so that a lost collar is no reason for anyone to go hungry. We actually had a little scare when I went to South Carolina recently. Thankfully, my husband was home and was able to program a spare tag for Dash, but he lost his collar (likely in a play session with his brother) and then promptly hid the darned thing. We still haven’t found it. But that close call was enough to warn us: be prepared for when we are not home.
Anyway, if I can clean out the junk drawers in the liquor cabinet, I can make sure that one drawer has all of the fireplace accoutrement we need and the other has the kitty accoutrement.
Then? I may crack into said liquor cabinet. I mean, I have to pace myself here. But, in all seriousness, I will have made some progress. Every month, though, I want to be able to hit the pause button, look around and point to some black hole or otherwise semi-permanent mess around here and note that it has been eradicated, never to return. Where we have done renovations recently, I’ve been largely successful. The upstairs guest bathroom is in great shape and all of the extra linens were donated this past spring. My closet is rocking it and all of those clothes were shared with a young lady just launching her career. But where we have just stuffed things to make space for renovations? Well, that hasn’t gone so well.
But now, it’s time. I can made some progress this weekend and that will hopefully give me momentum to carry on. And soon enough, by following my program of relentless incrementalism (that’s another post), the black holes will be eliminated. In time for Christmas? Maybe. By next Christmas? Definitely.
The Yuppie Homesteader 