CLEAN IT UP

When I decided towards the end of last year to tackle a happiness project in 2019, to counteract my empty nest syndrome, I didn’t realise how busy the first step would keep me.

And no, it wasn’t the physical work of discarding and tidying. It was the reading up, the listening to podcasts and the watching of documentaries and YouTube videos that had my head feeling like it was about to burst. Until I realised that I was busy adding to my ‘brain clutter’ in an attempt to postpone the real, physical work.

Not that my house was excessively full. About three years ago, I gave my wardrobe, books, dining room and garage the KonMari treatment (Marie Kondo’s tidying method), but everything had changed in the meantime. My house had become the Ideas head office and all the parcels, books and boxes are delivered here. We meet here and plan here and it can no longer be a house where picture frames still lean up against the walls after several years while I try to decide where to hang them. Because, strangely enough, frames are a problem for me. Frames, books (again) and magazines. And papers…