On Some of My More Unsavory Tendancies

I am a slob.

There, it's official: the first step to recovery is acknowledging your problem. Right?

The funny thing is that I don't actually like living in a super messy environment. I'm just too lazy to do anything about it, most of the time, until it gets so absolutely terrible that I can't even function anymore. My computer desk at school last year was a good example of that. My roommate was very tidy and usually had a good couple of square feet of cleared space on her desk, even with her laptop on it. Mine, in contrast, looked clean if it had more than four inches of cleared space. It was that cluttered. Once in a while I'd clear off the excess papers, textbooks, notebooks, et cetera and revel in all the open space... and it would get cluttered up again no more than a week later.

My bedroom at home is the same way now that I've sort of moved back into it. Part of the problem is that I have my college storage things (plastic drawers, tubs) and other unusual things taking up extra space in my already somewhat cramped room. So, since we've got an uncle coming to visit in a few days and my old roommate coming to visit right after that, I'm making a concerted effort to clean things up.

That's an undertaking in itself. Since I didn't have any room to put anything anywhere (part of the reason why things get cluttered in the first place), I started going through my piles (yes, plural) to see what I could throw out. There was a remarkable number of old papers that had no use anymore that I had kept for purely sentimental reasons, or had been thrown into the pile with this mindset: "Well, it's got some importance, so I shouldn't just throw it away now. I'll hang onto it." These end up being lots of old receipts, forms, and the ten-pound file folder (really) of promotional flyers, course catalogs, scholarship forms, and more from when I was doing my extensive college search/decision making process.

I have to say that I feel better now that I've thrown that out (technically, recycled it). I remember the college search being an arduous process wrought with worry, anticipation, and (a few times) tears. Now I'm settled and completely happy where I'm at, with all of those thoughts behind me. I haven't even really stopped to wonder what life would be like if I'd gone to PLU or University of Idaho (two serious contenders) instead.

But why did I hang onto those things for so long? In addition to being a slob, I'm also a bit of a packrat. It's very difficult for me to throw away or get rid of things that I've had for a while. I think I just get too emotionally attached, as silly as that sounds. For example, take the pile of T-shirts I had next to my bureau for the longest time because I didn't have room for them. I never really wore them, yet they sat there gathering dust because in the back of my mind, I thought "Oh, I'll wear those sometime..."

My sister finally went through my room and gave them all to Goodwill. She is a rock of... something in my life. I love her to pieces.

The funny thing is that her room used to be the disaster zone that mine now is, yet when you walk into it now, it's always very picked up and clean looking. What gives?