Some Forward Movement

I'm almost finished with figuring out and documenting one of the critical path processes on a project at work so I thought I'd take a breather and write an entry here. It doesn't pull me out of the woods, but it is a good step forward.  I am focused on trying to get out of the woods this week - and if not out of the woods then at least to a place where I can see the end of the woods. All in all the day hasn't been the most productive, but it has been productive enough that I really don't have anything to complain about.

Other than that, it has been a very nice day here.  The weather is warm, but only into the low eighties, so I have no space to complain there.  The air conditioner is doing a great job of keeping the living room nice and cool and the bedroom is only slightly muggy.  The new fan I've got does a great job of keeping the air circulating, so good in fact that I might scrap my old fan and get a new one of the type.

Tom made a run to pick up lunch, so that was nice, though I may question his choice of places to go. (Tom is my adult nephew who lives with me due to medical issues.)

It is a little later in the day then I thought it was, so I'm going to pivot back over and finish up the item I am working on in a few minutes and then, once that is finished and sent off, I am going to call it an end to the working day.  I also made some progress in cleaning and minimizing the living room this morning, while on teleconferences.

I was used to living alone for a long time, which is really nice since the only messes are your own.  Since Tom moved in it's been a bit of a struggle to find a new happy medium.  Adding people to any living space isn't simple addition, it is more along the lines of multiplication, at least when it comes to the incidental things that get left laying about and new to be picked up or put away if you're trying to keep a clean flat surface run in place.

Simplification and 100 Things

I've been on a journey toward simplifying my lifestyle through a minimalist approach to living for quite a while now, close to five years.  It has been an interesting and rewarding journey.  It has also been a battle with the tide of possessions that ebbs and flows.  In the last couple of months I've made some good headway, in part through a trick I picked up somewhere.

I call it 100 Things.

It works like this.  On my smartphone I keep a list of every task I do during my free time.  Everything I consider and carefully store.  Everything thing I clean.  Everything I donate, give away or simply through away.  When I've done a hundred things, I zero the list out and start over. For me, the act of recording and counting the steps I'm taking also inspires me to continue to take them, just like a Fitbit for Simplicity.

I tend to break it down into groups of 10.  That seems to work the best for me. As I go through the evening and weekend, I try and put ten more things on the list. I'm not always successful.  On a weekend day I can sometimes get around 30 a day.  The internal reward, for me, comes in watching the process unfold, watching the objects flow out.

I generally only record objects of significant size (bigger than a breadbasket) and tasks that take more than a few minutes.  If I need the extra motivation I may go down to smaller objects and shorter spans of time, but I usually don't.

If you are struggling with simplification it might be a trick worth trying for you.

Tuesday's Start

It's a bright and beautiful Tuesday morning here in California. The bird symphony is in full song, the sky is blue and it's crisp and cool outside.  I started the work day with a morning meeting regarding feedback from some business research.  It's interesting, but I am not sure it's actionable - or at least not actionable by our current team constellation.

The weekend was nice and I took Monday off as an extra vacation day.  I am getting ready to start the project run for the June release, so I thought starting with a long weekend was a most excellent approach.  My plan for the day is to try and get things lined up so I know the path ahead. I find that is I start a project from a firm foundation it's far easier to make a smooth run of it.

I made a good dent in my ongoing efforts to minimize my life-style, but I have some room to go. Part of that particular journey is the ability to part with "stuff".  I did read a good little rule of thumb last week that I have been carrying with me.  The writer recommended that you use three categories to define the items that you choose to keep.  Need it. Use it. Love it.  It's a pretty good little toolset.

(Original Photo - California Poppies)

A Nap and Minimalist Decor

I completely ran out of gas today at about 3:30. I am sure my body is recovering from the long distance drive. It is about 1600 miles, so it was a pair of 800 mile days, each taking 12 hours of pure driving time, plus, usually, an additional two hours of stopping for gas and meals.  That is a long time to be sitting in essentially the same position. I got home on Saturday night, rested up on Sunday, then headed off to work yesterday and today, so I reckon that I am still catching up.  I napped for about 3 hours today.

I'm going to work virtually tomorrow since I've got six different meetings and I suspect I am also going to need to take a nap tomorrow as well. That should give me the opportunity to make some progress against the headwinds I am running into on assorted tasks and projects.

I did observe/learn something while I was in South Dakota. I spent the time at the ranch with is decorated in, well, ranch style. My style is more minimalist here at the apartment in California (definitely influenced by TR). Even as minimalist in style as it is, I'm going to take steps in the coming weeks to become, yet again, more minimalist. I have a couple of pieces of furniture and some possessions that I can get rid of since I don't really use them. The time in South Dakota just emphasized my love of the minimalist style of décor.

A Collection of Morning Thoughts

I woke up at 4:45 AM this morning.  It was simply beautiful outside.  At that hour dawn is only a  faint hint on the horizon, everything is very still and quiet, and after our heat wave it is blessedly cool.  I lay in bed for a while and contemplated sleeping in, but I found I was already wide awake.  I woke up and padded around the house in the semi-darkness and just kind of savored the moment of the morning.

I discovered that at 2:11 AM my Blackberry had locked up.  That was the first time it had done that, so I did I forced restart by popping the battery and then putting it back in.  I hope that is not a trend, because otherwise I happen to like the Z10.  It is a sweet little phone and the only complaint I have is that the ring tones and message tones are on the soft side.  Since I usually carry my cell phone in my pocket, I like them to be a bit louder.

A nice hot shower, clean clothes, a cup of coffee, a bowl of Special K and I find myself moving smoothly into the morning. I have three days before I start my two week vacation, which will include my annual pilgrimage to Comic Con in San Diego.  I am looking forward to both the two week vacation and trip down to San Diego.

I've got a fair load of work to try and get wrapped up before I depart, but, I am feeling pretty confident that it is going to be a relatively clean vacation.  Now, I am sure that, at several points during the vacation I am going to peek into my email just to make sure nothing has totally exploded.  I would rather spend a few minutes of my time on vacation then come back to something fully engulfed in a work fire frenzy.

My monkey mind kind of skittered around this morning.  I am always amazed at the ability of the mind to pull me out of the moment and off into something that really has nothing to do with me, something I cannot influence, something I did not cause, something that only peripherally effects me because I am aware of it, or because it effects someone I know.  My mind really likes to solve puzzles and problems, so I think sometimes when it has none, it will quite happily borrow them or invent them. That is not necessarily a good thing.

Over the weekend I did a lot of cleaning in my living room, basking in the Zen nature of the simple and repetitive tasks, with an end result of a clean, neat and uncluttered living room. I love the feeling when I come into the living room and the clean lines of it inspire me to try and keep the same clean lines in my life.

When you read about simplicity, one of the things you'll read about is that your stuff, your environment, has a direct impact on your mental condition. I find that is very true. When my environment is simple and clean, my mind is simple and clean.  It's a great combination. I've mentioned in previous posts that my drive toward simplicity seems to move in waves.  I think I am about to enter another wave of simplicity, another wave of minimalism. I am looking forward to it over the upcoming vacation.

Doctors and Dust

I confess that, over the course of the last few years, I have made major stops toward living a minimalist lifestyle, striving for simplicity in many things, including interior decoration.  Simple put, my folks don't embrace that same ethic.  So, on the first day, I did as much simplification in the bedroom I am sleeping in as I possibly could, if only to make it more comfortable for me. Off and on over the last couple of days I've been cleaning the folks place, as much as I can get away with.  So far, I've gotten away with about 12 bags of "stuff" and I have permission to take out even more.

Today though was a day that was initially consumed with errands.  Tom had to start the day by running down to IHS in Rosebud to get his medications lined out.  Fortunately, he was successful and he now has his prescription filled for the next 30 days, with one automatic refill for the 30 days that follow after that.  He has to get his medicaid approved so he can schedule another surgery due to a growth on his pancreas.  IHS (and CHR) currently lack the resources to schedule it for him.

With Tom headed off to IHS, I headed into town with Mom and Bill.  First, I dropped Bill at the tax preparers, then I took Mom up to see the PA at her doctors office.  She is attempting to get more pain killers, but she is at the limit of what they are willing to give here.  She is having trouble managing the pills.  They renew them on a weekly basis, but she tends to run through them and come up short. The dynamic of helping her manage her pills is difficult. Tomorrow, a home health nurse to going to come out and visit with her and discuss the issue with her, though we're not real sure that is going to make any significant difference.

After her appointment, we picked Bill up and then took him up to the clinic as well, so he could also talk to the PA.  They discussed the difficulty of controlling her medications and the need for her to keep to the tight schedule of them.  We will see what the home health nurse has to suggest tomorrow.

Then, we stopped at Jolie's cafe in Winner for lunch, followed by a stop at the bank, then, finally, the drive back to the ranch (twenty six miles from Running's at the edge of Winner to the ranch).  Once we got back I moved all the cars in the big garage and shut the doors.  We are sliding into a winter storm warning, starting tonight, and running through to Wednesday morning - so, I am bracing for snow and ice. 

After we got settled back in, I helped Bill search for some tax documents (he had them earlier in the year, but could not locate them).  We didn't find them, but we did manage to sort through a lot of stuff and take it off in bags.  Then, I cooked dinner - a nice, hearty, potato cheddar soup that was very well received.  Following that, I tackled cleaning the kitchen counter - and let me tell you, that was a daunting task.

First, it was piled high and deep with several years worth of incidental stuff - and worst yet, incidental small stuff.  So I spent a good deal of time sorting through it, figuring out what was what, and throwing it away or putting it into it's proper place.  The kitchen is still a fairly daunting place, but the worst of it - the counter, was cleaned to the board.

Then, a call with my brother (and ruminations on the difficulty of communication).  From there, I did all the dishes, including a lot of miscellaneous containers that had been stuff with miscellaneous "stuff" on the counter.  When that task was done, I settled in here to watch a spot of TV, make an entry here, and settle in for the evening.  With the storm blowing in, tomorrow should be a good day for more cleaning - the big hitter ahead of me right now is still the den - but, on the plus side, the den is more junky then dirty and what is in there tends to be big boxes tumbled together, not necessarily with anything in them. (I made a foray into the den earlier in the day and scooped some of the out).

With that note, I am going to settle in for the night and enjoy a very quiet evening.

A Slow Journey Through An Old Box

I've started to slowly move things back into place in the house, sorting through them as I go. Tonight, I moved my computer table back into the spare bedroom (my office) and I threw out the contents of one drawer, one box, and an old light box.

The one drawer was an old desk drawer that contained some "stuff" that had probably been in there for years - old pens, old office supplies, old business cards, an envelope of old photos of no significance or quality. The only thing of interest that came out of that old drawer was an old pocket watch of mine. I'd almost forgot about it, so I moved it over in with my other watches.

The box was incidental paperwork that I'd held onto from about six months ago - since six months have passed I simply tossed it. Several of my boxes of stuff are now date stamped - if I am not in them after a certain amount of time passes away, out they will go.

The light box was an old light box I had kept from the days when we used to make technical drawings by hand. It's all done by computer now, so I have no need for it. It survived the last purge more from nostalgia and potential use that anything else - but, I haven't used it for over a year, so out it went. Once I get through my purging, I may take up drawing as a hobby again, in which case, if I need a light box I will just get a new one.

Over the next day or two I am going to break down and through away two pieces of furniture - an old desk and a four drawer bureau that I used in the bedroom. Both of them had been "stuff repositories" and with a few exceptions, I rarely dipped into them to use the stuff they contained, so by the law of usage they are done. Neither of them are of any particular value as furniture - both are just incidental pieces that were picked up somewhere along they way purely for their utility.

So, it was a night of steady progress in my minimalist journey. Slow and steady almost always takes us where we're going. Tonight's plan is simple - some DVR, some reading, and then some quality time with T.R.

Minimalist Tetris

Thursday, I spent the entire day playing Tetris will all of my physical possessions. Basically, I took the entire contents of the apartment and moved it into kitchen/dining room or patio - stacking it into the kitchen in the reverse order I would need to stack it out.

Amazingly, it all fit and with some room to spare. (That is a tribute to the distance I've traveled on my journey toward a more minimal lifestyle.) At about 8:30 the workers showed up to rip the carpet out and replace it with new carpet. They did a good job and were done by about 2:00 in the afternoon.

In between, I spent the morning wandering, running incidental errands, getting some service done on my car (including a detail), and picking up a new bedroom lamp and a pair of incidental stands. I've completely redecorated the bedroom in a very minimalist style. So far, the only things in the bedroom are the bed and the two new stands, with the lamp and clock. I have a new wall hanging (a collection of empty frames, which caught my eye and was inspired by T.R.) which I haven't hung yet because my toolbox is still behind a pile of boxes.

As I play the reverse game of Tetris and shift my worldly possessions back into the apartment, much of the stuff is not going to make the shift back. Since everything was moved into the kitchen, everything is up on the block. As I move each piece I am asking - do I really want this, do I really need this, and do I really use this? At the end of this particular game, I am going to end up with significantly left stuff. I might even make it as far down the path of minimalism that I need to go.

The Third Day of Vacation - An Incidental Day

If I had to characterize today I would call it a day of odds and ends. Breakfast with friends, I stop at the car wash, a few errands, a movie, some cleaning, and assembling some empty boxes for use tomorrow. Tomorrow will feel like the first true day of vacation because tomorrow will be the first day where I have to go to work but don't. The last three days were simply like an extended three-day weekend which happens to me every other week. But tomorrow, tomorrow morning when I wake up, I will lay there in the full realization that I don't have to go to work.

I have four things planned tomorrow. I want to do a couple loads of laundry. I want to wash the bathroom walls. I want to box the contents of my DVD collection. Finally, I want to pack my bags for San Diego. That should fill the day nicely. It might sound like a lot but really it's not, and should flow smoothly. I've got 10 empty boxes sitting here in the living room but I won't need them all for my DVD collection. Some of them will end up holding some stray books that have to go. I'm anticipating that sorting my book collection is actually going to be much tougher than sorting my DVD collection. I've already been through multiple sorts of my books, so what remains are the cream of the crop. I guess what I have to do is skim some of that cream off. Will see how good I am at it tomorrow.

As I played on the computer tonight I struggled with sleep. I should've taken a nap in the afternoon. I thought about it but then I got caught up washing the ceiling in the bathroom of all things. It had to be done! Of course, that's what we compel me to wash the walls tomorrow. You can't just wash the ceiling, you have to do the whole thing. Well, I am definitely looking forward to tomorrow! I am going to love that feeling when I lay in bed and realize I don't have to get up. Realize that Monday belongs to me. It's going to be a great feeling.

Running Toward Emptiness

I've been on the journey toward minimalism for the better part of a year and a half now. It was a natural inclination that found a window of opportunity when I was recovering from surgery last year and was definitely inspired and encouraged by TR. She is my touchstone of simplicity among other things.

I woke up this morning thinking about minimalism, thinking about the journey to simplicity, and specifically thinking about what my next steps will be. I've got new carpet coming into the apartment on the 29th. To facilitate that I need to move everything off the old carpet onto the portions of the apartment that are hardwood or linoleum. Since I've minimalized it's all actually going to all probably fit in the kitchen.I may move some of the longer term storage stuff out to the storage unit near my carport. I've flagged half a dozen items of furniture to go.

And I'm about to start when may be close to the final run to simplicity. As I approach it I feel like I felt when I donated my Encyclopaedia Britannica. I feel attached to the things I'm going to sort through and donate. Though there is no real attachment when I think about it it's all an illusion. One of my other personal touchstones as I've gone through this process has been sort of the utilitarian approach to it. I made sure the value of things based on whether or not I use them. It takes some effort but I've learned to set aside my assigned value. I'm learning to understand that just because society or someone else thinks something has value doesn't mean it actually does.

So that brings me to the point where I'm standing right here, right now. Having spent the day in contemplation, having searched for some sort of theme, some sort of inspirational reference, I decided to take an approach that will limit what I retain. Two of the areas where I'm going to do some healthy purging are my movie collection and my books. Now, I haven't touched my movie collection yet. I have previously purchased a lot of books. The book part of it is going to be fairly easy, the reality of many of these books is as much as I like them I don't use them.

And it's that same reality that's going to let me purge a big portion of my movie collection. The truth of the matter is two thirds of my movies I will in all probability never watch again. I'm going to try and restrict it even more, I'm going to try and keep only 50 movies at the most. I'm going to aim at keeping 50 movies and 50 books. I'm going to aim at keeping one five shelf bookcase. I'm going to try and get the entire collection into it.

Honestly, I expected to be hard. Donating the Encyclopaedia Britannica's set was not easy. I really struggled with that for several months. But in the end utility wins out. If I'm not using it what value does it truly half. Most of the movies you can buy for five bucks to for 10 some cheaper some may be a dollar or so more. And of course it got almost no resale value two bucks at best. So why let them take up the space in my life? Purely and simply they need to go.

TR said something the other day when we were talking about a related subject that's actually given me some fuel for this last purge. We were talking about the changes of technology and she had commented that everything of course is going digital and that includes our movies and music. That was an inspiring thing to say. DVD's are going the way of videotapes, they are nearing the end of their run. Regardless of my attachment to them their value falls every single day.with on demand and streaming they've rapidly becoming irrelevant.

So here I sit, on the edge of another short journey of simplicity, coming closer and closer to my goal of minimalism. I'm actually kind of excited about it. I think that the end of this cycle of purging I'm going to come very close to having maybe 10% of what I had when I started two years ago.

Now there is one thing that I'm keeping, one item that I'm clinging to. That item is my comic book collection. My collection of comic books and graphic novels and trades. I'm going to parse through it in the coming months, simply because it needs a good pruning. But that's a pruning I actually routinely do. Like novels some comic books are read once and forget. When it comes time to forget them you simply forget them. Comic books and graphic novels are one medium that has yet to successfully migrate into the digital world. Oh, you can find all kinds of scanned works on the internet. But, a big part of the older of comic books and graphic novels is the format.with that format comes a certain look, certain feel, certain texture.

TR and I had talked about that in regards to regular books. I'm a big fan of my Kindle, I do probably 80% of my reading on the Kindle.but there are certain books we need the actual book. There is a substance to a book that's lost in the digital media. Again, it's texture, it's scent, it's look, it's feel. All of those contribute to the nature of books themselves. It's definitely a Neo-Platonic kind of thing.the shadow of the book is not the book itself. Electronic text is just a shadow of a book. We can learn a lot from that shadow, that shadow can be very revealing, but in the end there is some substance, some invisible essence, that resides in the form of a book. There is a purity in a book, appeared either doesn't exist in electronic text. Poetry, art, philosophy, great literature – all of those best reside between the covers of a book. Does my lifelong love affair with books reveal itself? Good, it should.

Semi-Random Thoughts Early on a Tuesday

An early morning here in California. I went to sleep last night about 9:30 or so, after spending some time with T.R. and I fell straight into a deep sleep. I woke up this morning about 4:30 AM with no memories of dreaming, rested and refreshed. I laid there in the darkness for a while, contemplating the nature of the universe, and decided falling back asleep wasn't in the cards today. I got up, had Gort brew me a cup of coffee, made a bowl of cereal, and than settled in to ease my way into the day.

I mentioned in an earlier entry that I had gone up to the Los Altos Art & Wine festival and had a good time. As usual, I carried my camera with me. I posted five new pictures to my Flickr account. As I went through them I was amused that, of my favorite pictures from the day, none of them actually have anything to do with the festival. One of the pictures includes a couple sake bottles, but that was entirely incidental.

Here is the link: Los Altos Art and Wine 2011

I'm in final countdown to vacation of course. I have three days of work left and I am planning on going in a little early today, since I like to leave work as cleanly as possible when I start vacation. I already have one meeting planned while I am on vacation, but it is a pretty straightforward thing in support of a project I am a contributor on. It's a pretty top down driven program, so my contributions are limited. (The project team has been told what their result is going to be, so there really isn't any creativity or imagination there.)

The apartment complex here is going to install new lighting (ceiling lights with fans) in three rooms and new carpet on the 29th. So, on the 28th I've got to get all the stuff in the apartment (fortunately, there isn't a lot of it) moved off the carpet. Supposedly they can do the whole place in a single day, so it will be inconvenient but not to bad. I am looking forward to getting the new carpet. Between here and there, into the first couple of days of my vacation, I am going to do some more purging. I've got approximately six items of furniture and some more small stuff that I need to get rid of as I continue on my journey of minimalism. I parse out things I don't need or use and continually find, layered beneath them, more things that I don't need or use. It's been an interesting journey and I am curious where it is going to end up.

We're entering a period of high change at work, with many teams running in many directions looking at many projects, and changes in the process of how we actually operate as a larger entity. As with all change, the verdict is still out. There are things being done now that I do not like (my objection has primarily been with process, not results), as we seem to be transitioning to a very top down structure. Quite frankly, I am not sure it is going to work, but that may definitely be reflected in my own philosophy that an open and collaborative environment is far more effective and efficient. My boss came around the other day and scheduled a series of meetings for some workload redistribution and then asked us how we were feeling about it and I responded "ask the question again in ninety days". It's going to be a personal challenge for me to try and embrace changes I don't necessarily believe in, that I may in some cases actual think is movement in the wrong direct - but the thing I keep reminding myself is - everything changes.

To keep me focused, I've got one of my favorite little haiku displayed on my computer desktop at work. It is from Eric Lustbader's "The Golden Naginata".

We were dawn's dewdrops
Blasted from existence.
We were never stone.

I think it speaks eloquently to the transitory nature of the world, including the working world. The only constant is change. I think that as long as I keep reminding myself of that, I should be fine. I am currently in a place where I am well equipped to deal with the rising stress that comes with change. I will just approach in a focused and disciplined manner, with my sense of curiosity intact, using the variety of stress management techniques I had refreshed during my time in work stress counseling. Chief among those is this - give an honest days work, do the best you can, and don't become attached to the outcome.

The Light of Minimalism

Well, a sudden flurry of action on my road toward a more minamalist life style and it was all sparked by the the death of my lamp. For more that a few years I've had a black halogen torch style lamp as my primary lamp in the livin room.

On Satuday, it died - it simply stopped working and some basic trouble shooting could not reveal the problem so I decided it was time to get a new lamp. With a little help from T.R. I found an excellent lamp (Possini Euro Lightstack). I checked it out online and instantly knew that it was the one.

On Monday, after a game of pool at Edgies in Milpitas, I drove to Lamps Plus and gave it an in person inspection - it pased with flying color - great lines, great texture, excellent warranty. The only challenge was loading it into my car - the box it came in was taller than I was. Fortunately, with a bit of a front seat overlap, it fit.

I got it home and spend some time assembling it, having made a strategic error earlier in the day by vacuuming the living room floor and then unpacking the light. Once assembled I moved it into place and was instantly pleased by the purchase.

Besides being a great looking and working lamp it "fits" on a certain level. The old lamp was the bright halogen and this one is a significantly softer and warmer light.

On Tuesday, in the aftermath of the lamp, after work, I came home and went through my living room - removing and moving the incidental furniture around to open the room up even more. (It amazes me as I go minimalist how there always seems to be more room to go even farther in a minimalist direction.)

Once I'd cleaned the furniture out, I re-vacuumed the floor and made some minor rearrangements. I don't quite think the living room is in it's final configuration - but it is close to it, closer than it has been in a long time. Then, tonight, in the shadow of the new living room, I took the time to pack a couple of boxes of gently used clothing to donate tomorrow. I am constantly amazed that the process of moving toward a more minimalist life often moves in inspirational waves and that there always seems more stuff to go.

Some Thoughts on the Twelve Boxes

The great 11 box purge turned into a 12 box purge, because there was a box hidden down behind the others. In the previous entry I detailed the contents of the boxes and their disposition. To make a long story short – five boxes gone, five boxes of books kept, and two boxes of personal mementos. All in all it was a very successful purge night!

I got home from work yesterday, had a quick dinner of sushi (golden California rolls and Philadelphia rolls from Totoro Sushi Boat on Saratoga Avenue. http://www.yelp.com/biz/totoro-sushi-boat-san-jose

Then, I fired up the last two episodes of Mildred Pierce on HBO and dove into the purging of boxes. (If you didn’t watch it, Mildred Pierce on HBO was excellent.) I’ve often noticed that when I am purging “stuff” I often need to make a run at it, sort of a series of false starts before suddenly I dive in and start purging.

The vast majority of stuff that ended up destined for the shredder or the trash can last night was notes, notebooks, and personal papers – old records, old letters, etc. A lot of it was old work product or old school product that I probably hung onto at some time, for some reason, and that reason has long since escaped. I ended up with about half a box full of personal papers that I am keeping. These tended to be things that were either interesting to me, or related to my personal history.

Since they’ve been winnowed down to about half a box, they are a very minimal set of documented mementos and I am tempted to scan a good number of them in, and then purge them as well. I would like to organize the ones relating to my personal history into an album, so I can flip through it and reminisce, sort of like a photo album.

There is one remaining task, which is to shred the documents that contain person information, which I will probably do tonight – it won’t take too long.

I wound down the evening with T.R., who has been such a great inspiration for simplification, and then attempted to go to sleep.

I say attempted because my brain was in a complete whirl for about an hour or two after I laid down. I really didn’t fall asleep until about midnight, after several fits and starts. There wasn’t anything specific whirling about, I think it was just a general purpose whirl because in reviewing the records and documents there were a lot of old ones, ones that touched some very old places in my memory – it didn’t particularly call up any specific memory, but it swirling the whole pond around.

I had been blocked up against those boxes for quite a while and it is a very good feeling to have made it past them! On with further simplification.

The Twelve Boxes

This is a brief litany of the 12 boxes purged last night.

Box 1 – assorted mementos and personal items. None purged, but all repacked into a smaller box. This box is my “go to” box of small assorted items for display around the house and around the office. I rotate through it when I want a change.

Box 2 – Personal papers and notebooks. Purged 95% of them as they were just incidental notes or school/work product.

Box 3 – Sixty (five years) of Heavy Metal magazine. Holding as part of my collection. (Note)

Box 4 – Unsorted comic books. Holding as part of my collection.

Box 5 – Comic books and graphic novels. Holding as part of my collection.

Box 6 – Comic books and graphic novels. Holding as part of my collection.

Box 7 – Comic books and graphic novels. Holding as part of my collection.

Box 8 – A bag of personal photos (26 envelopes) and parts of old board games and cards. Kept the photos and purged the games and cards. I will purge the photos as well, since I am fairly certain all of the good photos are already in my album, I am sure these are the flotsam and jetsam of the old film days, however, I did want to quickly flip through them and make sure.

Box 9 – Personal photos, framed photos, diplomas, awards, certificates, etc. Like the mementos above, these tend to be the rotational display items. I am going to hold these and do a detailed sort.

Box 10 – Old personal documents, letters, records, etc. Purged probably 99% of them, held onto a couple that interested me as mementos. Contained sensitive data so they will be headed for an industrial shredder.

Box 11 – Same as Box 10.

Box 12 – Same as Box 10.

Note – I have four “collections” – books, music, movies, and art (generally comic books and graphic novels). I’ve already done a massive purge on the books, reducing four five shelf bookcases to a single bookcase. I moved all of the CD’s from their jewel cases into binders, so instead of 500+ jewel cases, I now simply have 2 binders of music CD’s. Ahead of me I have two more space-creating purges. First, I want to do the same thing with my movie collection that I did with the CD’s – remove them from the jewel cases and reduce their footprint to a pair of binders - I have probably 400+ movies, so they should land comfortably in two binders. Then, I want to go through my comic book collection, and winnow through some of the titles, and re-organize it or refocus it.

Contemplating A Sweeping Purge

My brain ended up selecting a direction for the day about lunch time. I was sitting at lunch, reading the Mercury News, and glanced over the apartment/townhouse/loft advertisements, since I am contemplating moving. One of the things I am contemplating is moving into a smaller and less expensive place – not because I need to save the money, but because I’ve been on this journey toward a minimal lifestyle for a while and, truth be told, I have more space than I really need or use.

That brought me around to the 11 boxes. I’ve mentioned before that, of my great minimalist sweep, all that really remained is 11 boxes in the closet in the spare bedroom. I have some sort of psychological barrier that is preventing me from purging those boxes. I took a look inside four of them nearly a month ago, shuffled things around, managed to toss a few things in the trash, and then put the boxes back.

Well, since then, I haven’t been in those boxes at all. Here is a simple truth I think – whatever is in those boxes is essentially valueless in practical terms. I neither utilize the contents nor contemplate the contents. They are simply objects in boxes. I am holding onto them because they MIGHT have some practical value (but, if they did, I think I would have used them by now) or they MIGHT have some sentimental value (but, if they did, I think I would have pulled stuff out and contemplated it by now). But they don’t. Sheer practicality tells me they don’t. I need to find the reserves of strength, get in there, and ruthlessly purge.

I have a few other areas in the apartment where I need to apply the same ruthlessness and purge, purge, purge. I keep joking that I am going to end up sitting on the living room floor, eating from my blue bowl, watching my big screen TV, in an almost empty apartment. That isn’t far from the truth. Once I have stripped things down, once I’ve made another purse sweep – and realistically I am going to be able to purge close to 50% of what remains without really blinking an eye, then I might more seriously contemplate moving. It would be a big change, but I am due a big change. Funny how becoming smaller means, ultimately, becoming bigger.

The Pocket List

I was getting ready to go to work the other day and I was starting to feel harried. I kept having to circle back and pick up one last thing before I left for the office. Out of curiosity, when I got in, I sat down and made a list of all the incidental “stuff” that goes into my pockets or hands as I leave for work. In no particular order…

Keys, wallet, change, pedometer, Blackberry, Blackberry Case, Blue Tooth, eye drops, wrist watch, blood glucose meter, small brown leather notebook, pen, gloves, hat, sunglasses, reading glasses, employee badge, mints, and a traveling coffee cup.

Whew. No wonder I feel like I keep circling back.