Saturday, May 31, 2008

Taking a break now

My week of having the house to myself is just about over. I didn't quite get done with all the work that I'd hoped, but I got just a tiny bit of gardening done and I did lots of other useful stuff. Like laundry. I did tons and tons of laundry. At this point I'm thinking that I should maybe even get out some of the winter stuff I put away and wash that too, and then I'll have washed just about every article of clothing I own, except maybe for the costumes.

And now I'm debating should I put clean sheets on the bed now or wait til tomorrow. And I am wondering if my husband is coming home or not. He was nice enough to call me last night and tell me that there was a slight problem and that he might not be coming home til tomorrow. But then he doesn't follow up with a phone call today telling me if the problem is resolved. I'm currently going with the assumption that he is coming home later tonight. I should officially call it quits for a while on the cleaning and the sorting and just change the sheets and have a bath and call it a day.

Again, it is much like a few weeks ago. I took bags of trash to put on the curb, so why don't I see more empty space in the house? I did make a little progress. Before he left, my husband bagged up some clothes that he didn't want anymore, and this morning I donated the unwanted clothing to a garage sale. And then I threw out a bag of my own clothes that I decided wasn't worth donating.

So I made some slight progress, and then I started to over think things again. Like should I keep these candy tins from Christmas? I know that some really beautiful things can be made with polymer clay and other odd things such as little candy tins. But I'm not especially good with the polymer clay yet, and while I'm into ceramics I probably won't take time out to learn about polymer. So do I want to hang on to the tins until such time as I want to work with polymer? On the one hand, the tins are small and not really taking up that much space. On the other hand, it will start to add up, and some of this stuff needs to go.

I did a lot of work Wednesday and Thursday, and I even managed to get some work done yesterday after the mammogram. I was the first one there, and they let me go in a little bit early. Today, I felt a little bit sick, and spent most of my time watch DVDs. I was not really sick enough to excuse the inactivity, but I guess I've again gotten to the point that I just don't push myself to do something when I don't expect to see much for my efforts.

It's early, but the clean sheets and a bath really sound like a good idea.

4 comments:

Purple Pigeon said...

I'm exactly the same, I'll think ''no, i might want it for something'' and the three years down the line I'm still holding on to a box of jam jars. Its mad.

What annoys me is that after a week of intensive sorting, clearing and throwing away, in a month it will be just as bad. Maybe its just cuz we are arty people. I'm sure bank managers and accountants don't have this trouble!

dmarks said...

Garage sale season, going to bookstores on Saturday morning, and things like that can undo all the progress.

DD said...

I've been making a real effort to clear out & am finally seeing some results. I just have to do a little bit at a time, otherwise the enormity of the whole thing overwhelms me and I just don't even get started.

I love my books and hate getting rid of any.

laughing said...

I'm pretty sure that a lot of my problem comes from being an artist, but I realize that that isn't always the case. My dad used to mention that his father would also hang onto useless junk that he would find, just in case someone might need it later. But he did manage to keep the stuff outside and in the garage, and grandmother kept the house clean. I don't remember him being an artist. And I've seen these people on TV who go shopping all of the time, and they have tons of stuff that they end up never even using. They have clothes that they never wear, and then the clothes go out of style, and eventually even the clothes don't even fit them anymore, and so they have a whole room full of boxes and bags of clothes that are of no use to them. And then they have books that they never get around to reading and small appliances that they buy when they are on sale and then never take out of the boxes. And then when they need something they can't find it and so they buy another one, and then maybe there's another sale and they forget that they already have something and so they buy another one and maybe end up with three of the same thing. And if those people had any artistic anything it wasn't mentioned, just that they had this need to keep buying things and some of the stuff never got used and some of it never got thrown away. I don't think that I have much in the way of clothes that I've never worn, but I probably have clothes that I'll never fit into again. I probably do have a few books that I haven't read, but I bought a lot of books at a sale before I realized how bad my eyes were going to get and I just don't like to read as much as I used to. But this other stuff takes up so much space that while keeping it might have something to do with me being an artist, it does eventually take up so much space that it tends to prevent me from making any art. That isn't much of a problem at the moment, with my main things being ceramics, which I mostly do at school, and knitting, which I mostly do either in motel rooms or in bed. But if I wanted to start doing something else at home, if I wanted to paint or do sculptures or even make Christmas ornaments, I just wouldn't have any space to do that.

Of course this weekend I did go to that one garage sale, which I did at least managed to leave it without buying anything and without deciding to have a look at the other sale down the street. But we did also go to a couple of bookstores this weekend and I expect since he has the next two days off that we'll be going to a few more bookstores. This is sort of our weekend, and before it's over I might end up adding to the problem somehow.