Cluttering - A Celebration

Subject: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 19 Jun 08 - 10:55 AM

Maybe this should be a blog, but I'll post it here first in the hope at least some of you might be sympathetic.

The story so far: Sedayne & Rapunzel fetched up in rented accommodation in Lytham St Annes back September on account of their house in the rural hinterlands of Durham remaining unsold at the time of Rapunzel starting her new job in Blackpool. Rather sensibly, they chose a basement flat comprising the cellars and former servants' quarters of a huge mock-Tudor sea-side semi, circa 1920, because it was a) cheap, b) big enough to contain all their crap without renting further storage and c) divine location-wise with views across the Ribble Estuary to Southport from the garden. Now, read on...

The Durham house is now sold, and contracts have been exchanged on the new house up in Fleetwood with completion tomorrow. Most of our stuff remains in boxes from last time, but in the 9 months we've lived in LSA we've managed to fill an entire big Ikea Leksvig bookcase with numerous & indispensable tomes picked up from hereabouts. Windmill Books in Lytham is especially good, as it's currently doing everything for £2 a throw (for a real treat, ask about the warehouse). There's some good bookshops in Preston too - I picked up a fine edition of Alfred Percival Graves's Celtic Psaltery, and the Opie's Lore and Language of Schoolchildren, amongst others; lots of others; in Southport we've bought some fine vintage Randolph Caldecotts, including The Fox Jumps Over the Parson's Gate, and any amount of vintage pamphlets, guide books, & King Penguins, including the exquisite Leaves of Southwell. As unrepentant beachcombers the same shelves are cluttered with diverse sea-bird bones, mermaid's purses, stones, shells, and other such flotsam gathered on our daily constitutionals. Every house should have a nature table; our house is a nature table.

And the CD collection has grown apace too, largely as a consequence of Action Records in Preston, which has furnished us with teetering piles of essential works by the Penguin Cafe Orchestra, Dr Strangely Strange, Daevid Allen, Robert Wyatt, Sun Ra, Man, Gong, Slapp Happy, Sigur Ros, Dolly Parton, David Bowie, Roxy Music, The Fall, Sex Pistols, Young Marble Giants etc. etc. We've also picked up loads of good vinyl too, including a hitherto unknown recording of Il Pastor Fido featuring Rene Zosso & a copy of Martin Denny's Exotica 3 for 50p from a charity shop in Fleetwood on our first day of house-hunting. You get the idea. We begin moving at the weekend; endless boxes stuffed with a lifetime's accumulated clutter & more musical instruments that one might reasonable shake a stick at, though there, to be fare, me & the mother-in-law are thinking about setting up an ebay shop, also dealing in sundry car-booty & such-like, but nothing of any consequence, and certainly none of the hundred or so Jew's Harps & Gew-Gaws that are the pride of my collection. Under a glass dome, there stands a stuffed Gentoo Penguin by the name of Hortense; one day, she will have a companion.

Somewhere up in Fleetwood a house presently stands empty, silent, and wholly uncluttered; little does it suspect the deluge about to descend upon it, nor yet the child-like jubilation of the new incumbents as boxes are unpacked and the clutter let loose, spilling all-anyhow, thus transforming this mere house into a veritable home for however long it is until we get bored with living there. Problem is, since leaving our respective family homes, neither Rapunzel or myself have lived anywhere for longer than 6 years, and, in the nigh-on 9 years we've been together, we've lived in six different places. Yet still we curate our wondrous museum; a museum of joy I call it, for without it, I fear, life would be rather empty somehow.

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: GUEST,Ewan Spawned a Monster
Date: 19 Jun 08 - 12:38 PM

Erm... can I move in with you? Sounds lovely.

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Irene M
Date: 19 Jun 08 - 03:04 PM

I take it that you don't dust any more than I do. (It pays to be short sighted. Take off your glasses, and the dust is no longer there.)

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Acorn4
Date: 19 Jun 08 - 03:20 PM

A poem:-


"Minimalism - NO!"

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 19 Jun 08 - 07:44 PM

Sedayne, I live surrounded by voluminous, useful stuff & your place sounds like mine, tho bigger as it is a house & shared by 2 collectors.

One of my mini-collections is penguins. How furtunate you are to have a real penguin under glass, I hope she soon gets company. Most of my penguins live on an old stool, others are hanging on the side of the cabinet next to the stool & I have lots of laminated pics of penguins on the wall behind.

I'll be moving to a larger place in a few years & will get professional removalists in to pack.

I'm helping a friend make a collection of her voluminous accumulation of paper ephemera (postcards, cards, programs, journals/magazines ...) by putting it into archival quality folders & boxes. She laughed at me one day when I asked her for a small bag from a gallery in Ireland as one of my mini-collections is bags from other countries! Humph, fancy a collector laughing at another collector.

sandra

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Geoff the Duck
Date: 20 Jun 08 - 03:14 AM

Sadly we can't find any of our clutter.
It's all underneath too much JUNK!
Quack!
GtD.

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 20 Jun 08 - 05:34 AM

Ah, if only that were our house Geoff... our junk is under a whole heap of crap, topped off with a layer of cat fur.

Part of my dragon collection is still in a box from when we packed to move house 11 years ago... we filled the shelves with clutter before I found the box, and now there's no room.

LTS

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Acorn4
Date: 20 Jun 08 - 06:02 AM

I suspect you've got Lord Lucan and Shergar in there somewhere!

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Houston_Diamond
Date: 20 Jun 08 - 06:06 AM

That sounds so lovely;

I live in a poky 1 bed council flat with my gf and 2 sons. I have family who visit tell me to declutter all the time but I can't think where to start. I love all my instruments from the largest sized to the smallest. I have stones and flotsam from sidmouth beach among other places I've been to in my life. In the past 3 years I've been at uni I have accrued another bookshelf of books and several computers. The past 6 years kids toys have multiplied in exceeding growth and to top it all we have 2 cats which are glad we cant swing in our flat of memorable trinkets. The bedroom is filled with 3 lots of furniture where we wait patiently to be upgraded to more bedrooms for our children. I love all my things and could never bring myself to losing any of them as they all have meaning to me, how could I declutter? How could anyone for that matter if it was stuff I didn't want i would have thrown it, give it away immediately or not have got it in the first place?

You have great taste and after reading your post I want to move away from London to your neck of the woods because of how nice you made it sound :D

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 20 Jun 08 - 06:10 AM

It's a fine line between clutter and collection.. the skill is in determining that difference.

LTS

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Houston_Diamond
Date: 20 Jun 08 - 06:10 AM

Nice one LTS will have to remember that one :D

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 20 Jun 08 - 07:48 AM

To clutter is to curate by aesthetic intuition alone; to collect is somehow more focussed, but the two aren't mutually exclusive. My collection of antique brass windmills for example, much less all the Green Man reproductions, whistle flutes from the world over, antique clock chimes & other such gew-gaws gifted over the years. We also have a complete collection of Alia Vox CDs in their own Leksvig CD tower...

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Bat Goddess
Date: 20 Jun 08 - 08:23 AM

I consider cat hair to be a sort of mulch -- it keeps the dust off the furniture.

My general theory of housework is that if you have a lot of interesting things to look at, no one notices that the house is a mess. Friends once described our house as looking like the storage wing of the Smithonian Institution -- I chose to take that as a compliment.

Of course it helps if other things (books, papers, magazine, etcet etcet) are neatly stacked (hiding the floor; sigh) and shiny surfaces are shiny (or at least a few key ones).

And then there's tarps...

Linn

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: GUEST,Van
Date: 20 Jun 08 - 12:34 PM

In French there is a saying - "laissez les coins s'approcche" - let the corners get closer. I feel that this is as good a motto as I can live up to.

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: lady penelope
Date: 20 Jun 08 - 02:05 PM

Ooh do I speak and voice 'heresy' upon this thread... *G*

Whilst being far, far away from being 'minimalist', I do tend to reach 'stuff overload' at times. Possibly living in an 8x10 foot room till I was 27 has something to do with it, but I've never really been a 'stuff' kind of person. Generally when I start not being able to find the things I want or I become terrified at the prospect of becoming the victim of a 'stuff' avalanche should I try to find something, then I start insisting on 'stuff' being gotten rid of.

Of course, books and music do not count as 'stuff' (books were the one sort of item my Mother would happily let me store outside my room at home when I ran out of space. To her reading is more of a religious practice...) and I've discovered that we really do need to add some serious book shelf space someplace, because I've now reached the point where I can't find books because there's too many books in the way. The cds will be reaching the same point in about another 6 months I reckon.

Anyway, to make more room for books, something else is gonna have to go. There's only so much room in the loft and I hate having to store things we either no longer need (or never have done) or simply don't use. It irks me as I could be using that space for necessary stuff, like Peter's photographic gear and my material hoard (Honest, I will get around to making all those tops, trousers, dresses and coats.... *G*) for example.

This is made slightly harder for me as my husband's a natural hoarder. I think it's genentic. Apparently his Great Aunt's garage was full of flattened boxes from all the goods they'd bought during their entire marriage (some 60 odd years and that was just the garage mark you...). Mind you, we did get a spiffy top hat and a toasting fork out of that...

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Bee
Date: 20 Jun 08 - 02:18 PM

We have lived in this house for more than twelve years, and I am right now staining the enormous bookcase husband finally built for me so my poor books can come out of their boxes and off their toppling heaps throughout. The place was serene and spacious when we moved in, and I have unmercifully cluttered it since!

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 20 Jun 08 - 02:37 PM

There is a holiday called Discardia..several times a year..it might be coming up with the solstice..it is somewhat astrological as to the dates...mg

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Bat Goddess
Date: 20 Jun 08 - 08:54 PM

Ah yes, books! Tom didn't realize when he married me (26 years ago next Wednesday) that he'd be spending the rest of his unnatural life building bookcases.

There was a wonderful cartoon in the New Yorker a few years ago. Two women are sitting on a couch in the living room and one says, "Actually, I rather prefer the stark look. But we've nevr owned a house big enough."

Linn

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 20 Jun 08 - 09:06 PM

Wonderful quote, Linn - I had a dream ...

One Day I Will Buy a Lottery Ticket & I will win the lottery. I will buy a house & I will have a beautiful Japanese room containing one beautiful scroll & 1 beautiful vase for meditating.

The rest of the place will be filled with my collections & other stuff.

sandra

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 21 Jun 08 - 11:36 AM

Books! Why do I love them so? Why can't I stop acquiring them?

My mother used to say, "have you read all these books?" But then, of course, I hadn't (and in some cases still haven't). I'm convinced, though, that the unread ones contain information that will either prove to be useful or excite, entertain or amaze me one day. And the read ones have already excited, entertained or amazed me, and I can't bear to part with them!

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Acorn4
Date: 21 Jun 08 - 02:14 PM

There used to be a saying where I grew up that things would come in useful every seven years.

I can never find anything when I've tidied up - I've got a sort of instinctive filing system in my brain that directs me to wherever things are.

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Houston_Diamond
Date: 21 Jun 08 - 02:19 PM

I do the same except I call it organised chaos :D

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 21 Jun 08 - 07:43 PM

I know exactly where I've put things.... it's just other people in the house don't bother to ask me where they are first and pull everything out.

LTS

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: gnu
Date: 21 Jun 08 - 08:12 PM

My piling system is simple... one pile.

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Bat Goddess
Date: 21 Jun 08 - 09:20 PM

If I only had a single pile it would, alas, reach to the sky.

Linn

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 22 Jun 08 - 03:46 AM

Did you hear about the Indian Scientist who invented the Ran Dom Heap filing method?

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Little Robyn
Date: 22 Jun 08 - 03:07 PM

Somewhere in amongst my junk I have a wee poster that says
"Genius thrives on clutter"
Unfortunately our clutter has been added to by a 2 year old living with us and playing with 3 generations of toys - some of mine, some of her Mum's and lots of her own.
At least my shelves of books, tapes and records are still in place but you can hardly walk on the floor because of her books, cuddly toys and this weekend, the damp washing hanging on the clothes horse by the heater.
Help, I'm drowning!
Robyn

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: SharonA
Date: 22 Jun 08 - 05:50 PM

On a bulletin board that is currently horizontal and sandwiched between other large horizontal things, I have posted an old "Frank and Ernest" comic strip. It shows Frank in the midst of a pile of assorted stuff, saying to Ernest, "My motto is: A place for everything and everything all over the place."

My motto too.

In 2004 I celebrated Discardia (locally the holiday is called Trashmas) by donating heaps of no-longer-wanted stuff to the local charity thrift store. I have a record of it -- pages and pages and pages of things large and small. Even so I hardly made a dent in the piles and piles and piles of stuff I have... and I've since filled in the dent and created a new bulge with even more stuff, so things are more impossible (and rooms more impassable) than ever.

Guess it's time to start brushing up on those Trashmas carols again. 'Tis the season to, by golly. I'll never get to the point where I can see more than half the floor or even a third of the baseboards (and I don't think I'd enjoy that anyway) but I want to achieve Clutter -- that lived-in look, not the stored-in look (or the about-to-be-evicted-from look!).

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Acorn4
Date: 24 Jun 08 - 07:30 PM

Strange how this thread is less cluttered than the de-cluttering one!

Someone (not me, I hasten to add) once said:-


Boring people have tidy houses.

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Bat Goddess
Date: 24 Jun 08 - 07:49 PM

I have a nicely framed version of that sweet sentiment hanging in my bathroom (amidst several very cluttered -- by choice -- walls).

It's right up there with "Everything Tastes Better With Cat Hair In It".

Linn

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 25 Jun 08 - 05:35 AM

somewhere in my useful stuff I have a photocopy of an old poster "A clean desk is a sign of a sick mind"

sandra

why is Google asking if we 'Want to see the Penguins? Observe them in their own ..." - I can understand why they give a link to a site to "End Clutter Problems. It's better than a massage." - but Penguins!

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Acorn4
Date: 25 Jun 08 - 11:15 AM

The of course there is that closely related subject of gardening.

I did actually used to do weeding, but two weeks later it was as if I'd never been there.

Some weeds are very attractive and we can comfort ourselves that our garden is becvoming a butterfy sanctuary.

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: katlaughing
Date: 25 Jun 08 - 10:44 PM

Just because some of us are trying to de-clutter doesn't mean we are tidy or boring!**bg** we moved from a house of about 1700 square feet to one about 894...some thing's gotta go!

Linn, my mom used to tell me I should sell tickets when folks came to my house; she said it was just like a museum with all of the neat stuff I'd picked up when living back there.

Here's what George Carlin said about stuff (yes, I posted it to the other thread, too:)

"That's all you need in life, a little place for your stuff. That's all your house is: a place to keep your stuff. If you didn't have so much stuff, you wouldn't need a house. A house is just a pile of stuff with a cover on it. That's what your house is, it's a place to keep your stuff while you go out and get more stuff. Sometimes you gotta move, gotta get a bigger house. Why? No room for your stuff any more. You've gotta move all your stuff, and maybe put some of your stuff in storage. Imagine that there's a whole industry based on keeping an eye on your stuff."

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 26 Jun 08 - 08:37 AM

in a couple of years I'll be moving my very cluttered stuff to a bigger place cos this place is too small!

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: SharonA
Date: 26 Jun 08 - 09:12 AM

I remember a manager where I used to work, who once said smarmily to her crew, "Clear desk, clear mind."

To which I responded, "Empty desk, empty mind??"

I got a dirty look from her for that one... and oddly enough I never got a promotion from her.

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: EBarnacle
Date: 26 Jun 08 - 01:32 PM

We just put up six book cases. If we are lucky, we may actually reclaim part of the basement so we can build boats. All the stuff down there is from my move 2+ years ago. Without shelves, it could not be put up, even though we were brutal when we got rid of stuff before I moved.

Subject: RE: Cluttering - A Celebration
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 24 Jul 08 - 09:58 AM

Just sorted out my stack of vinyl onto the new Expedit 5x5 Ikea shelving unit (thanks to Ross for the inspiration!). No easy task given all the shuffling it's undergone during the various moves of the past few months. A few surprises including three Nic Jones Trailer albums I never knew I had (Songs & Ballads, Noah's Ark Trap, Nic Jones) and the alarming discovery that I have two copies of The Young Tradition's Galleries Revisited and Mario Lanza Christmas Carols - fine albums both, especially the latter, but I'm at a loss to account for the duplication. Nice to see my signed copy of The Transports again (complete with a Bellamy-doodled Quantas flag on the ship!) and nice to see my Saturn edition of Sun Ra's God Is Greater than Love Can Ever Be, which I'd forgot about completely. This I do before I set up the hi-fi, to minimise distractions...