31 Days To Get A Grip

I’ve got 31 days to get a grip, sort everything out get organised once and for all, because if, after these 31 days are up, I am not organised I might as well just give up and admit it: I will NEVER be organised.

Why only 31 days? Well we’ve all got to have deadlines and because October is my birth month it seemed like a good idea at the time. This October I will be 46.

There I have said it.

FORTY SIX.

No longer in the first bloom of youth.

I can’t deny it I am a grown up and probably closer to death than I will ever be again to my birth. It is time to get things organised and if I can get my 46 year old life sorted at the same time then that will be no bad thing.

I need to get my head round a few problems

So I will sort out the easiest one first - all that paperwork.

Oh God there is SO much of it.

Bills and invoices, advice notices and iddy biddy bits of paper all over the place. Stuffed in draws hastily packed in boxes, ‘filed’ or not as the case maybe and the majority I bet not even important but I won’t know that until I have sorted it all out.

I have a fear of losing important things and so rarely throw anything out and because I put things back in random places I lose bits of things then panic when I find the other bit that I must keep it because I don’t know if I chucked the other bit out.

I suspect there are bits of things awaiting their other bits in disparate places all over my home and as you know it is rather large.

How did I get into this mess? Well I first joined it with someone else’s mess and they left it to me to sort out, only thing is I don’t know, without their help, what I should or should not keep. We are talking about bits of paper that go back 25 years! The countless bits of paper guarantees for all those electrical items which you may or may not still own that’s if they are not broke beyond all repair,

Do we really need to keep them all ?

I know there are the bits and pieces one keeps for sentimental reasons like the dossier you have on the buying of your first flat, car, garden shed but for some people sentiment is a load of tosh for others it is social history in the making.

Somehow I need to strike a balance between interesting and important. There’s no point diving through another's paperwork without at least finding some secrets or insights…

Do you think I’ll make it or am I doomed to a disorganised life?

Having too much...

I have too much. Too much stuff. Too much of everything and I just can’t keep up. I could of course give it all away but let’s be realistic here that is very unlikely to happen because a) my husband would have a fit, b) my kids would have a fit, and c) not all of it is my stuff in the first place - it is theirs.

Problem is I am the one who has to sort all the stuff out whether it be mine or theirs. I have to find homes for it all then I have to ensure it is kept clean and mended; I have to put it away and not lose it. If it does get lost I have to know exactly where I put it even though I may not actually be the one who put it anywhere. Case in point: the backdoor key which was “lost” for two days. It turned up in my husband’s pocket but not before I was blamed and told that I am just too disorganised and am forever putting stuff back in the wrong place.

It’s not as if anything has a right place anyway…

I will hold my hand up and admit that I am not a naturally tidy person. But I don’t think it should be my sole responsibility to know where everything is and be able to keep it that way. The rest of the household should bear some responsibility.

My husband nods emphatically in agreement but I know that in the middle of my rant to him his nods are merely placatory because he actually wants to go and have his morning constitutional in the smallest room with only the newspaper for company.

I get a lot of nods.

But in the end they leave it to me and I feel like I am drowning.

I frequently burst into tears – when they are not here – sobbing that I cannot cope but somehow I do. Maybe it is the fantasies I have that get me through. The ones I have of burning the whole damn lot. Seeing my home go up in smoke and do you know what I smile at the thought. I imagine the relief I will feel when there is nothing to find, nothing to lose. Starting over and boy how it would be different…but in reality if it did happen I bet within a few months I would be right back where I started with far too much!