Grime under the sink, it’s time to go. Day 192/365

      Where did all this grime come from? A mystery that I’ve decided I don’t need to solve. What I know is that all at once it gets to me and I know it’s time to clean. 

The good news is that this time there were no jars, sponges or brushes to toss. Maybe my desire for simplicity is paying off. I just hadn’t accumulated those extra just-in-case things.

Grease in the oven, it’s time to go. Day 191/365

     Just what you wanted to see--my greasy oven. Most of us have one, a greasy oven that is, even if it is self-cleaning. Mine is the regular old-fashioned kind. 

     Today I got spraying and wiping. I hated using up paper towels, but it seemed like the best way to go. I sprayed and wiped a couple of times and then said, “Enough! Good enough.”

     If you were to examine the results in person, you’d only give me a C+. That’s better than D- or an F, but I don’t use the oven enough for it to get dirty enough for me to flunk Oven Cleaning 101.

Glasses cases and dead batteries, it’s time to go. Day 190/365

     My project was small this morning, but high on my list of places to clear out. In our kitchen across from the refrigerator is a handy home-made shelf that we bought at a flea market years ago. Every kitchen needs such a shelf as a catch all for pens and pencils, paperclips, tape, hair brushes and all the etceteras that appear over time. 

    Today, besides getting rid of dead batteries and glasses cases, I consolidated thumbtacks, safety pins, post-it pads, and performed a major dusting.

Stuff and dust, it’s time to go. Day 189/365

     It has been four months since I posted on this blog. It isn’t that I’ve lost the desire to get rid of stuff; far from it. Rather, it has been my lack of will to do anything about it. My bad. My original intention, to let go of something for 365 consecutive days, failed long ago. Currently my goal is that on the 365^th day of purging our home will only retain things we really need--things of utilitarian value as well as carefully selected treasures of beauty, such as pictures, books, photographs and a few favorite sitters. I’m half way there and hope to be living in this simple bliss by December 31, 2015. You’ll know how well I’m doing by my posts; if I post, I’m making progress.

     Here’s what I wrote today on my www.acottagebythesea.net blog, which is about silence, solitude and simplicity.

Again I’m dealing with all the stuff (and dust) in this house. I like to say that I want simplicity in my life to be represented by a very few things—two sets of dishes, three changes of clothing, the books I really will read-- which may be why I love being at the cottage. As you might imagine, the owner from whom I rent has things all over the place, but they aren’t mine to care for, consider, or even dust. Here at home, however, the responsibility is mine and my husband’s.

     It has come to me that I am dealing with a two-pronged concern. The first, and real one, is all the stuff. The second is all the thinking I do about the stuff, all the thoughts that consume my mind. Thoughts about too much stuff, the time it takes to deal with it, how and where to get rid of it, how to even begin….and on and on. The bottom line is that I just want all the excess stuff to go away.

     As I sit her writing, I realize that what is more important to me than simplicity of things is simplicity of thought about them. This morning, before 9AM, I organized the mud room. Summer towels to the attic, a mess of extension cords out to my husband’s work bench for him to deal with, books and white elephants bagged for the church fair. I did all this purging and organizing without pre-planning or thinking. It was simple.

     My plan, after I post this on my cottagebythesea.net and lettingofstuff.blogspot.com blogs, is NOT to think about dealing with stuff until tomorrow morning, when I’ll take on some other area, perhaps just one shelf or drawer. Can simplicity of thought lead me to simplicity of things?