the order of things

Happy New Year, kind readers, I’m wishing you contentment and peace in 2016!  Thanks again for all your interest and encouragement in my writing and in my SLSR plans. 

To set the tone at the start of my current two-week holiday staycation, I went to a day spa for a massage.  On my way home, I drove to the post office to pick up a package.  As soon as I turned into the parking lot, I thought “oh, this was the wrong order, I should have gone to the post office before the massage.”

The antiquated US Postal Service building near me serves a big population and it was a few days before Christmas.  The driver behind me started honking, but we were all bumper-to-bumper until someone in the tiny parking lot left.  Maybe the driver was originally from a location where honking is more an existential statement than a cautionary vehicular communication.

It actually didn’t take me long to park, retrieve the package, and back out.  But then there was a long wait for the traffic light allowing cars to leave.  I honked my horn at a driver backing up who came close to hitting my car.  I inched forward.  And when I finally escaped the parking lot, the driver behind me raced into a merge lane so they could pass me.  To be clear, I believe these were all interactions with the same driver, not two or three separate assholes.

“Merry Christmas!” I shouted at the speeding car and then thought “yes, me too, me too.”  Years ago, I would have either simmered in anger or tried to analyze the other driver’s behavioUr.  I rarely give it time anymore.  I don’t know their story.  And I acknowledge that, some days, I am the asshole driver to others.

Anyway, it was the wrong order of things.  The next day, I went back to retrieve another package and parked in the nearby mall and walked to the post office.  I like when I REMEMBER lessons.

I’m thinking of the new year ahead with excitement: my plan is to move back east for SLSR in spring 2017, so will this be my last year of working full-time?  In preparation of moving and minimizing, I donated or sold a lot of stuff last year but there is still a long way to go.

Soon after starting this blog in 2014, I was planning to write about my successful PAPER purge.  I am still blocked!  I have boxes of file folders, journals, notepads, letters, cards, communications, etc.  Although I’ve had a few go’s and sent a lot to the shredder, I just haven’t been able to finish this task (if I rate a 10 for Excellent at starting things, I only rate a 5 at finishing things).

In October, I read The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up and one of the unique messages is the importance of minimizing by category (not room) and in a specific order of categories from easiest to most difficult: clothing, books, papers, miscellaneous, and then finally memorabilia.  For my last push to further purge this year before moving, I will try this method in the above order and report back here on the blog along with other updates on successes, failures, lessons learned, and lessons remembered.  Honk!  Honk!

References and related links:

• SLSR: simpler living semi-retirement.
• The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo