Reorganizing

I spent the last two weeks of February reorganizing the back bedroom. Every night after work I’d hurry home, eager to get started. I’d change into my comfy fleece pajamas and socks and sit on the rug in front of the bed to sort through clothes, knickknacks, and other treasures and ponder how best to store or display them.

When I began the reorganization process, clothes, Christmas decorations, and photography props were scattered all over the house, hidden (and often forgotten about) in various trunks and cabinets. My goal was to group all like items together and designate a single spot for each group. In the back bedroom I planned to keep only my clothes, some figurines and other pretty things for decoration, my camera equipment, and the props I’ve collected for my toy photography hobby. Everything else would be moved out.

Reorganizing was cozy, lamp-lit work. Cats purred and rolled on the rug as I sorted and arranged faux pearl necklaces, doll hats, human hats, and other odds and ends. I listened to audiobooks and sipped hot tea. I guess what made the sorting so much fun was that it gave me a chance to appreciate all my little “valuables” and savor the memories attached to them. For example, I got to spend some time admiring a sweet little puppy finger puppet that I rescued from a parking lot in Atlanta nearly 30 years ago. I remember I saw him lying there lost (it was obvious he’d been there for days and had been rained on and run over) and I felt so sorry for him that I had to take him home with me and give him a bath and stitch up his wounds. He’s now got a very nice, snug little home in the back bedroom. He’s relaxing in the old doctor’s cabinet, in a teacup.

I was able to whittle down my wardrobe enough that everything fit neatly in the back bedroom’s tiny closet. No longer do my T-shirts and jeans spill over into the large cabinet nearby. Instead, I’m able to devote that entire cabinet to my toy photography hobby—to my stuffed animals and props. I’ve filled it with Beanie Babies, San Rio characters, antique teddy bears, doll-size parasols, fake cupcakes and candy, hand fans, silk flowers, rhinestone tiaras, and other bits of whimsy, and when I open its doors I feel like I’m entering a small wonderland. Every last item in the cabinet “sparks joy” now, as Marie Kondo would say—so I think my reorganization effort has been a success!

I’m proud of how tidy the bedroom looks in these pictures. I just hope I can keep it this way!