Some Reflections About my Closet. (no. i'm not kidding. why do you ask?)

Today, I cleaned out/organized my closet.

::pause::

Let's observe a moment of silence for this monumental occasion. It happens roughly once every two years. Or three years; maybe it's been three years since I've done it, who knows? Not I.

I always hate to do it because 1- as we all know, I'm possibly the most sentimental person ever and throwing something away or banishing it to the dark recesses of the attic strikes fear into my gooey heart. 2- It's a Really Gigantic Undertaking. My closet isn't super duper big, but it's big enough to be crammed-jammed to the brim, (and I do mean the brim,) with sheet music, cast off headbands, old purses that I daren't throw away because they might come back in style, ribbons, scrap book stuff, books... pretty much everything under the sun, and then some. No joke. Today, I found a receipt from 2003 from the Dollar Store where apparently I bought:

2 chenille puppies (????)
1 Christmas apron
1 wax catcher (no clue what that was)
Tic-Tacs

The receipt is yellowed and brittle, but obviously I can't throw it away because, duh, it's basically history now. And so, it has to be stored somewhere, and oh, look, there's my closet with nice shelves freshly cleaned off and waiting for Dollar Store receipts! Aaaannnd, we're back to square one.

You get the picture, right? I DID throw away a whole Wal-Mart sack full of trash and odds and ends, and I stacked my music neatly and put all my purses on the same shelf, and neatly re-folded and categorized my clothes, but there's always those items that don't really fit in anywhere, bless their hearts. Things like my welcome package from the bank, which I probably shouldn't throw away, but it's really just taking up space on a shelf, (I threw it away - I figure the bank has whatever I need, right?) and the seven, yes seven, wide headbands with ties that I bought year before last when they were in style, but are they in style now? No. Will they come in again? My head aches at the very thought, but probably so, therefore they have to have a place to live til their glory days return.

See, there's this little memory that keeps me from being ruthless: about three years ago, in a moment of cleaning-out frenzy, I put a cream colored, dainty shrug in the yard sale pile, because I hadn't worn in in a year, and the very next month, what do you think I bought? A dress which needed a little something. Something like a cream colored, dainty shrug. Yeah. I still haven't recovered emotionally from that incident.

And then there's the t-shirt covered in signatures from Camp when I was twelve. I mean, that's not something you just toss into the garbage, but neither is it the thing you keep in your drawer, seeing as how I probably couldn't still fit it over my head. I sat in my closet floor for roughly ten minutes, drowning in nostalgia, as I read the messages from people in my life still and waaay out of my life, remembering that particular year, etc., and seeing again the crowning glory of that shirt: a ring of flame around one sleeve, drawn by my then-crush, and his name beside it. Oh, that drawing made my whole week. Scary, I know.

Anyway, the shirt went into a sack in the attic with my old dress-up slip which I'm saving for posterity. Posterity, I'm sure, will greatly appreciate a stained t-shirt with faded ink scribbles. The point is, it's out of my closet.

Also, do you know how many pennies can find their way into your closet? Lots. And I obviously can't throw away money, but nor do I want seventy pennies making my wallet so heavy I become a cripple by twenty three. Hmmmm... hey, look! There's my closet with all those nice empty shelves!

Now I know that I have twelve scarves. (and isn't it nice that it's an even number? i would've been disappointed if it had been thirteen scarves. yuck.)

Oh, and apparently I was unconsciously storing food for a famine, since I found a Very Stale thing of pringles, two mostly-empty bags of craisins, and a Very, Very Stale Nutty Buddy bar, not to mention twenty peppermints, some still in the package, some not. (Those who were not had done an admirable job of clearing up some of the dust in the corner. They certainly deserve a vote of thanks.)



The best part of the whole experience? I finally found my short black slip that I've looked for for months. Score! The downside was that I didn't locate my taser's charger, which makes me a trifle uncomfortable, but hey, I still have a thing of mace.

The End. (Hasn't this been a fun, educational story? Aren't you glad I decided to write this instead of going to bed early? Just answer that silently, please. No public demonstrations of joy.)