How to Simplify Your Surroundings

I have always been something of a pack rat. Everything should have a place and be in it, but you should also never get rid of anything. You might need it again.

That said, since I have a decent amount of storage space, I have Rubbermaid boxes full of knickknacks, games that I don't play anymore, old school supplies, books and clothes that I haven't worn in years.

If I had less space, the great purge might have come sooner, but I have plenty of room for all this stuff. And, I had no idea how much stuff I really had until I started thinking about trying to move it all.

Then, it became clear, it was time to get rid of a lot of stuff. And, I think my husband and I have changed phases. Every so often, usually every four or five years, we adjust our lives. For much of the last four years, he has been in college, so we have accumulated toys and video games and schoolbooks and stuff. And, there is the great collection of action figures that adorns nearly every room in the house.

But since we have decided to move on, looking around the house is kind of intimidating. All I see is stuff that I don't want anymore.

Thankfully, I have Amazon and Ebay to help me in my quest. We've started by getting rid of books. We are both gamers, so we have a lot of books. Books for Dungeons & Dragons, Vampire, Werewolf, Deadlands, Shadowrun and a slew of other role-playing games, not to mention just the plain old fiction books we have collected over the years.

My answer: Amazon.

Who knew that selling stuff through Amazon could be so profitable? Some of the books we have are out of print and hard to find, but imagine my surprise when I started selling them and got more than what I paid for them initially!

The next step is to get rid of the old board games and toys and clothes on Ebay. This is a much bigger step than Amazon is, because I'll have to get out the digital camera and take pictures of everything. That step is rather daunting, so I've been putting it off.

I'm also waiting for spring so that we can have the huge yard sale that we need to get rid of all the miscellaneous stuff. My friend Dawn is reorganizing her life, and moving cross-country in about six months, so we are planning at least one very big yard sale this spring.

In the past, we've taken advantage of a community-wide yard sale and done pretty well on sale days, but this time, we're having the sale at my house. Primarily, this is because Dawn has furniture stored in my basement and then we just have to bring it upstairs, but it is also due to the sheer volume of stuff that we have in the basement.

But all those plans are simply ways to make a few dollars from the great purging. The real important thing we are doing is creating a mindset for the purging and making it happen.

It starts with the decision that I am never going to use my high school and college research papers again. Sure, I could type them up and post them to Associated Content, but most of them are not on a computer anywhere anymore. And, it is really worth retyping and formatting a 15-page paper for $4?

Does anyone really care about a college freshman's research paper discussing whether the Anasazi were cannibals? Quite honestly, do I really even want someone to see a paper I wrote 20 years ago?

The files upon files of paperwork that we have kept will be among the first things to go, but there is more.

There are those craft supplies I bought, convinced that I was going to turn one corner of the basement into a craft area and do more crafting. It hasn't happened. It's not that I don't like to craft. I do. But the small pieces attract the cat's attention and I certainly don't want her swallowing earring findings. And, writing is much more financially rewarding than my crafting ever was and more relaxing.

So, there are three or four boxes of good craft supplies that need to get moved upstairs for the yard sale.

Then, there are the boxes of Halloween and Christmas decorations. I haven't used most of them in at least two years and there are a lot of them. It's time to sort through them and keep what we use, sell the rest.

Finally, there are the clothes. Some of them are simply too small and I need to acknowledge that I can buy newer, more fashionable clothes in that size should I ever reach it again. The problem is that I am too sentimental. I still have the outfit my husband bought me our first Christmas together. Despite the fact that I can wear it (a fact I am damn proud of), I won't. It's fashion value is zero.

And, I've got t-shirts from things I've done and places I've visited over the last 20 years. I think the original intent was to make them into a quilt of some sort, but we'll just refer back to the paragraph earlier on crafting and acknowledge that this isn't going to happen.

There are clothes that were gifts, but that I never liked, and clothes that I bought for a costume or special occasion, wore once and then packed away. This spring, it all goes away.

The decision to end these pack rat tendencies has been made. Now, if I can just follow through...