Stuff

So a few weeks ago I blogged about our new closet systems and my journey from clotheshorse to relative minimalist.  I thought I'd round that topic out by writing about my general journey toward relative minimalism.

I used to like stuff.  A lot.  I look at photos of my childhood bedrooms and I’m always taken aback by how much crap I had, even through my high school years.  From weird dolls on display, to movie posters wallpapering the walls, to old books crowding my bookshelves, to drawers that could barely close, to the hundreds of art supplies, I am amazed by it all.   It’s in such stark contrast to my house and attitude on stuff now.  I pretty much hate stuff!  I feel like my main goal in life is to get stuff off of my kitchen counter!

My crazy cluttered room in high school.  Why is there a smurf in the background?  Why am I wearing a tiara?  Questions for the ages.

I’m not sure when that switch in my brain toggled but I think it was when Matt and I lived on Surf Street in Chicago.  Our Diversey apartment was huge and we’d just gotten married so we filled said huge apartment with all of the crap we each owned plus all of the crap we asked for (and some we didn’t ask for) and received for our wedding.  We loved that apartment and had so many great times there but it was a 4^th floor walk-up with no air conditioning and a faulty water heater.  We lasted 1 year before moving to our place on Surf Street, which we really loved and still miss.

Matt and I the day after we moved into our 1st apartment together in June 2006 on Diversey Street in Chicago.  There are so many crazy things about this photo (the red couch! my crazy shirt!  my old nose!) but I think my favorite is Matt's flip phone.

Even though the Surf Street place was objectively nicer in every way, it was definitely smaller than our place on Diversey.  Every room was smaller and it had fewer of them.  Gone was the 2^nd bedroom, dining room and den (though we did get an extra bathroom, in-unit laundry, and a landlord who turned into a friend, which was well worth the switch).  Our full kitchen with butler’s pantry was replaced by a galley kitchen with no pantry at all.

Happy times on Surf Street.  Note the kitchen cart (one of many) in the background.

Our apartment felt cramped and we slowly started getting rid of things that we didn’t really use or need. 

Moving to LA in 2010 also helped a lot.  We sold almost all of our furniture before we left Chicago and we put a lot of our stuff in storage in Tarzana.  By the time we moved out 9 months later, we found we didn’t miss a lot of it.  Plus, our apartment in Palms was about 1,000 sf, which made minimizing clutter a necessity. 

That amazing day that Matt and my Mom accidentally dressed the same when we lived with them. It has nothing to do with de-cluttering but who cares?

After we moved into our house, I bought a hutch to fit all of our china and stemware... which we NEVER used.  I found myself going through purges where I would give away a few things at a time and see if I missed or needed them.  I did not.

It felt awesome to give these things away and I started going down a rabbit hole of minimalist blogs like this one and this one, which propelled me onward.  I gave away so many of the extraneous things that we never, or rarely used, but that I kept out of a weird sense of obligation to the people who’d bought them for us.   

I used to have 12 margarita glasses; now I have 0.  Guess how many margaritas I have served in the past decade?  None!  Same for pilsner glasses.  I got rid of my black “everyday” place settings and started using my fancy white china every day because I like that better anyway.  The sky didn’t fall!  

Our hutch is now empty.  Literally not a thing in it. We're having a yard sale this weekend mainly so I can convince someone to take it off of our hands.

I could go on and on but I’ll spare you the gory details of what did and did not make the cut.  I’ll just say that by the time I got around to reading Marie Kondo I had nothing left to get rid of.  Sure, I could force the kids to give up various toys and knick-knacks but I'm not scrooge and that stuff is all temporary anyway.  Eventually it's all making it's way to goodwill as Lily discovers that all she really wants is her phone and laptop anyway.  

It also helps that I don't take the view that minimalism is some objective standard set by someone else.  It's all about paring back on my terms to a level that I'm comfortable with.  If you saw my house you probably wouldn't immediately think "she's a total minimalist," because I still have things in our bookshelves, pictures on our walls, candles in the bathroom, etc.  My goal is for me to feel like I can breathe easy in our home, which I can't do if there are piles of papers laying around or toys on the floor because their bins are overflowing.

The funny thing about minimalism is that getting there is really gratifying and kind of addictive.  It feels so cleansing to sort out the things we don’t need from the things we do.  But once you’re there it’s actually kind of boring at first.  I was like “what do I do with this free time now that I don’t have to sort through things and get rid of them?"  I wanted to keep going but I hit the end of what I was willing to part with.

Then I realized that was the whole point.  Without the distraction of buying stuff, maintaining stuff, getting rid of stuff and hitting repeat, I actually have free time on the weekend to do things like read a magazine, take a nap, or take the kids to the park or the beach.  Sometimes I get that nagging feeling like I should be cleaning or doing something productive and I have to remind myself that it's all taken care of.  Cleaning takes remarkably little time when there's not much to gather dust.

All that said, I have to admit that it takes a lot of willpower not to re-accumulate all the crap we've gotten rid of.  I, like most Americans, really like buying things.... even things that I don't really want or need.  I treat myself in areas like beauty products, which are stored behind cabinet doors anyway and ultimately get used up, instead of more permanent things like home furnishings and clothing.  And when I slip up, I beat myself up a little bit and move on.  

I've been mulling over an eventual career change to organization and decluttering consultant because I really love doing it all but I'm pretty much done with my house.  Let me know if anyone wants some free help with yours.  ;)