Yesterday I had Ginny and Sorin at my office for a few hours - and it became painfully obvious just how messy my office was. Now, to be clear, it has always been very, very obvious - but it wasn't painfully obvious until yesterday. Luckily, no one got hurt - but there were definitely some close calls as Sorin (who has only been walking for a few weeks) was attempting to navigate around the room. So, I decided it was time to take what I had been learning throughout this process at home and bringing it to the office. Here's some of the dangerous territory as it stood this morning:
It's amazing how I manage to function in this office, but somehow I do. But as I was going through the stacks of papers, boxes, and other items in these photos, I could only imagine what the subconscious conversations were that went on in my head that made this occur. Here's a few examples of what I can only assume they were:
"Wow, I've got a few zip drives in here. Now, I haven't seen anyone use a zip drive in 5-6 years, so I can probably send all these to surplus to let them decide if they are trash or can be recycled or re-purposed. But, I guess I should hold on to one, just in case someone comes in with a zip disk that has a file they now realize they desperately need from 7 years ago. But, if the drive I keep fails, then that's no good... so I better keep all 12".
"Hey, here's that specialized USB cable I was looking for last week - turns out it was in this box from when I moved offices a year and a half ago. I definitely need to put this somewhere where I'll remember it. Ooh, I know, I'll put it back in the box, with the other 27 cables just like it that also lived in this box without being needed for a year and a half. But... what if I forget these are in here? Problem solved - I'll just order 52 more of them, so I'm sure to have one on hand. But where to keep those when they arrive... I know, in this box!"
"Hmm... I literally have no idea what this is. I better hold onto it in case someone else needs it some day."
If these conversations didn't happen, then I really don't know what to tell myself or anyone about how my office got that bad (What's that you say? Maybe the problem is that I've been lazy and have just stacked stuff up for years on end rather than going through it? Bollocks, I say, bollocks. And that's a word they use in England, so it most definitely has to trump anything you could now say in response.). But this doesn't even tell the whole story of how bad my office was - you see the red/yellow/orange box at the bottom-center of the second picture above? That's not even my clutter. Apparently word has gotten out that clutter is allowed in my office, and clutter has been migrating to join it's kin. I had never even seen the contents of that box before, but it's apparently been living in my office for over a year now; and that's assuming I didn't move that box of "not my stuff" from my old office... or even from my office before that.
But enough living in the past. Here's what my office looks like now:
So much better. I feel confident that my children can walk around my office without risking life and limb simply by being anywhere near the floor. And my office is now completely clean.
Well, accept this part:
...and this part...
...er... and this part...
...and, um... this part...
So, yeah, it's a work in progress
It's amazing how I manage to function in this office, but somehow I do. But as I was going through the stacks of papers, boxes, and other items in these photos, I could only imagine what the subconscious conversations were that went on in my head that made this occur. Here's a few examples of what I can only assume they were:
"Wow, I've got a few zip drives in here. Now, I haven't seen anyone use a zip drive in 5-6 years, so I can probably send all these to surplus to let them decide if they are trash or can be recycled or re-purposed. But, I guess I should hold on to one, just in case someone comes in with a zip disk that has a file they now realize they desperately need from 7 years ago. But, if the drive I keep fails, then that's no good... so I better keep all 12".
"Hey, here's that specialized USB cable I was looking for last week - turns out it was in this box from when I moved offices a year and a half ago. I definitely need to put this somewhere where I'll remember it. Ooh, I know, I'll put it back in the box, with the other 27 cables just like it that also lived in this box without being needed for a year and a half. But... what if I forget these are in here? Problem solved - I'll just order 52 more of them, so I'm sure to have one on hand. But where to keep those when they arrive... I know, in this box!"
"Hmm... I literally have no idea what this is. I better hold onto it in case someone else needs it some day."
If these conversations didn't happen, then I really don't know what to tell myself or anyone about how my office got that bad (What's that you say? Maybe the problem is that I've been lazy and have just stacked stuff up for years on end rather than going through it? Bollocks, I say, bollocks. And that's a word they use in England, so it most definitely has to trump anything you could now say in response.). But this doesn't even tell the whole story of how bad my office was - you see the red/yellow/orange box at the bottom-center of the second picture above? That's not even my clutter. Apparently word has gotten out that clutter is allowed in my office, and clutter has been migrating to join it's kin. I had never even seen the contents of that box before, but it's apparently been living in my office for over a year now; and that's assuming I didn't move that box of "not my stuff" from my old office... or even from my office before that.
But enough living in the past. Here's what my office looks like now:
So much better. I feel confident that my children can walk around my office without risking life and limb simply by being anywhere near the floor. And my office is now completely clean.
Well, accept this part:
...and this part...
...er... and this part...
...and, um... this part...
So, yeah, it's a work in progress
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