When we were curled into our city apartment, I longed for an attic and basement. A place to put the shit. Old school files, winter clothes, the present from the in-laws that wasn't quite ready for the Good Will, a half used can of paint, and the old lamp. We had the shit piled high in the closets in the city, and I longed for the space to carefully organize the shit into bins and shelves with labels.
So, now I've got an attic and basement and I just spent hours organizing the shit. Juiced up on antibiotics and dancing to Pandora, I hiked up and down the stairs with the files of old student evaluations, lecture notes, and textbooks. We have the B-list book shelf in the attic and the B-file cabinet. But the B-list book shelf is over flowing, so I had to purge the shelves. Good-bye Lenin, Heidegger, and a tattered copy of Rousseau.
I have the kids' clothes sorted by age in bins. Bins of cute kid pictures. Old pictures in albums. Camping equipment. All that could be slimmed down further.
The kids bring into all sorts of new papers into the house. Every week, I have to empty their backpacks of tests, worksheets, and art projects. I stack them on a book shelf in the dining room for disposal later. They get upset if they see me throwing away their hard work, so it must be done when they're not around. But I haven't had time to sort through the papers in a while. OK, since September. So, that's another mess waiting for me.
It just takes time. I would rather do something more interesting and productive than sorting through the debris of life. I have let the shit pile up during the semester and I am making a transition, so the shit is particularly high at the moment. It's rather tempting to just close my eyes and dump everything in a trash can. But there may be a diamond in there. Like Ian's old Thomas sneakers and Jonah's Mother's Day card. That old book might make an excellent footnote in the next book.
Apt. 11d 
Wow, your productive. We have an attic, a basement, and a garage, all beautiful set up to organize (shelves, cupboards, closets, etc.). We still have unpacked boxes from a 10 year old move (actually, I think perhaps I actually did something about that over the last summer). But we still have a 12 year old computer (there’s just no reason to save it).
I was proud of myself yesterday ’cause I actually carried a bag of toys down to the basement. My kids bring things up, and never take them down again. They also won’t let me throw anything away, and have oddly extraordinary memories. My son actually remembered and found a toy that he’d seen once, in someone else’s house a year ago.
Maybe your industriousness will prompt me to do something. The key is getting buy-in from the kids.
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oops, you’re (presumably there are other typos, but that one required me to repost).
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With certain toys and stuffed animals, I have had to establish a temporary trash. I hide the toys for six months to see if there are any tears about losing those things before I actually pitch them. Pain in my ass.
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Wait until the attic overflows. Our city does a spring-cleaning every May: the garbage men come round and take away anything left in front of the house. The last two years, we’ve hauled stuff down from the attic and have piled the sidewalk in front of our house (about 60′ frontage) high. We can now see some of the attic floor.
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I envy you your attic. I have just a basement, and here in soggy coastal Maine, mold is a real problem. I put all my boxes on wooden pallets that I scavenge from Borders or the local grocery store.
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Laura, I used to rotate toys.
I am now (temporarily) down to a 12 x 20 room plus of course the storage unit (remodeling).
I’m going to weed things out as I bring them back from storage, I think.
but of course there are the high-bulk items like ski clothes etc.
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I let each kid have a large (purple) tote in their room. (I’m sure any other colored tote would work equally well, but can not vouch for the results…) They are allowed to keep as much old schoolwork as will fit in that box. They are reasonably good about throwing stuff away from year-before-last and like going through their old work. No tears. Not my problem anymore. Lets them learn to throw stuff away. (Looking at my piles of junk, I wish my mother had taught me that lesson.)
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A basement is typical rather then builds the whole building… Thanks for sharing your ideas…
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