Dear Mrs. Meyers

I decided to tackle my house this week. Go ahead. Congratulate me. I figure it's the first time I am not pregnant or technically post-partum in four years. It's time to get to those things I've been avoiding...

I knew our quaint bungalow needed some big organization and a deep clean. So I went through the same process I use for EVERYTHING:

1. I read

The real Mrs. Meyers writes this book with basic 1950's housewife advice for those of us who have become a tad too liberated to be competent at all with a mop...

2. I did some internet research:

http://www.innovativelyorganized.com/

My cousin Elizabeth is a professional organizer. She is amazing and I know somewhere we have similar genetic coding. But I think her organizational systems gene is not from our shared Puerto Rican lineage. I am organized enough that I hate clutter and it makes me miserable. But not organized enough to be mobilized to find a solution besides crying and yelling at people I love.

3. I went shopping.

Before I could begin I decided I needed (drumroll please!) new cleaning products! What could motivate, inspire and comfort me more in my battle than some trendy retro products. Obviously I must have Mrs. Meyers Clean Day products to really achieve the clean home she describes in her book. I had seen the brand at Target and went off to buy it. Well, the Target I went to did not carry them. Sadly, I exchanged dreams of Mrs. Meyers for Mr. Clean and a pile of bins, baskets and some bunny ears that were in the dollar bin that bought me 45 minutes of shopping with my 3 year old but did not help in my goal to have less stuff in my house.

I got home and began Phase One: The Purge

I explained to Sophia that we would be packing up toys that she does not play with. She responds with enthusiasm. This would be a fun game. I start with stuffed animals. Who should we pack away? She thinks about it real seriously for a couple of minutes. Well, she says with a sacrificial air, "We can pack up Telly."

But this makes me sad. Why does Telly get the shaft? Sophia and Olivia have, between them, close to 100 stuffed animals! All sorts of animals, in many sizes and colors. Yet, upon reflection, she chooses to reject Telly. I can't do it. This was how our purge began. It was a long day.

I bagged up books and stuffed animals. I packed a whole lot of plastic into the largest bin Target sells and put it in our shed. I boxed up puzzles and blocks and fire trucks and airplanes. I kept chanting the summation of all I learned about Buddhism in undergrad: We...Suffer...because we are attached....to things...that are IMPERMANENT.

Our house was built in 1930. At the time it was under 800 square feet, had two bedrooms, one bathroom, a small living room, dining room and kitchen, two tiny closets and no pantry. Its safe to say a family of four or five lived here quite easily.

I think about this mystical "family" sometimes. I wonder how they kept the stuff out. Where did they keep their bins of things they weren't using but might use someday? Or their box of t-shirts they would never wear but they occasionally like to look at nostalgically? Where did they store the toys they wanted to rotate out seasonally? Or did they realize early on that no matter what they bought, their children would prefer building tents with the couch cushions and scotch-taping their fingers together. Or is that just my children? Hmm...Perhaps I will write Mrs. Meyers and ask...