And Less is More

Decluttering and reorganizing. That's my ongoing mission. I continued again last night, getting rid of about 2 bags of my romance and poetry books and 1 bag of my son's board books. My husband came home to see me reorganizing the books I had left, wanting to know if I could whittle it down to just one book shelf.

Uh... NO!

On top of being a pack rat, I am a bookophile. Is that a word? I think so, but I'm not goint to "Google" right now--y'all know what I mean in any case. I have reading material in every room of the house. In the closet. In the dining room. Under the beds. In the drawers. In the pantry.

Books have been my friends for a long time. Books shared their secrets with me and inveigled me into many adventures. I've laughed and cried with my books. I've treasured them...no folded corner pages, no cracks in the spine. It's damn hard to say goodbye.

So the ones I've kept are my favorites--the ones I return to over and over again. Julie Garwood, Nora Roberts, Elizabeth Lowell, and Christine Feehan are a few of my favorites. They cover the genre in romance from historical to paranormal. Yes, vampires can be very sexy.

Part of decluttering is getting rid of what you don't need. And not accumulating more. That will be a toughie. The key, or so I'm told, is getting rid of something you have if you are getting something new. Out with the old, in with the new. And knowing where you will put the object before you buy it.

I still have piles of crap around the house. But each day I'm tackling them one by one. I figure by next year I should have the house well decluttered. I should probably get rid of the glass plate I was giving at my engagement party that I have never used and is still in the box. No, it wasn't a gift from my Aunt Gertrude... but it was a gift and it's hard to shake that mentality of giving away something someone gave to you.

Decluttering my house... decluttering my life...

Cleaner. Lighter. Better.