A New Trend: Cautious Decluttering

I used to recommend getting rid of anything you don’t need or want. If it’s something you don’t want, get rid of it right away and then take your time replacing it until you find what you love.

But that was then.

Now that the supply lines are clogged up, who knows how long your wait will be. You might want to hang on to your old item, hated though it might be, until you can replace it.

Here in the U.S., we’ve been used to finding things easily, because there were always lots of sources for new goods. But now, new isn’t always easily obtainable. For instance:

  • On our furniture search, we learned that many furniture factories are running at a six-month lag, and in the case of La-Z-Boy furniture, up to a year.
  • A young couple we know of decided to buy a new camper. They just learned there’s an eight-month wait for the specific model they want.
  • An older couple we know signed the papers for their new house last February. It was supposed to be ready in August. That date has been changed to December, maybe.

Part of the joy of decluttering is getting rid of things right away and seeing the empty space that results, space you may or may not intend to refill. Now that decision is being taken away from you. If you get rid of something you need, like a sofa or a kitchen table, you may have to go without one for a while.

The Loveseat Saga Ends, Finally

You may remember that just before the pandemic started, we made the decision to replace our large old furniture with smaller pieces, because our old furniture was too big for our little living room. It just didn’t look right.

We started with the tv stand. We had been using our old sofa table as a tv stand, and it looked large and messy, with lots of cords hanging down the back. So we replaced it with small tv stand from Wayfair.com that holds all of our DVDs (though you can’t see them), and we’re very happy with it.

Then the pandemic hit, and for a while furniture stores closed, and then they were only open for limited hours, and furniture was limited because the factories were closed. So we gave up for a while, though I was looking at loveseats and small sofas online the entire time.

A month ago we replaced our living room carpet. Out with the old brown wool, in with a bright cream nylon. What a difference it made! But we needed a temporary parking spot for the giant loveseat to get it out of the living room before the carpet guys arrived. We soon discovered it wouldn’t even fit in our little kitchen! So my husband and son squeezed it through the front door and put it in the garage. Once the carpet was installed, we decided not to squeeze the loveseat back in through the front door, but to sell it instead. So off we went, furniture shopping for its replacement.                                                                                   

Two days and four stores later, we were depressed. We didn’t find a single thing we liked. Everything was big and bloated and made out of cheap fabric, even if the price tag was high. One store was a sea of light gray; boring! So many pieces were uncomfortable. Online reviews often said the same thing so buying a loveseat online was out.

My husband then came up with a great idea; why not get a bench instead of a loveseat? It would be smaller, but would provide extra seating when visitors are here. We both began looking online and it wasn’t long before we agreed that we’d found the perfect bench.

It arrived in less than a week and now it sits in our living room and we love it. Next step: new, smaller recliners and a small chair for the spot by the window.

Placing Things in Appropriate Spots

I had just woken up this morning and reached up into my closet for something when I accidentally bumped my jewelry box and brought it crashing to the ground, sending pierced earrings and other pieces of jewelry everywhere, and breaking the trim off the front of it.

Unfortunately, I have a bad knee and couldn’t kneel down to pick up that mess. Fortunately, I have a helpful husband. He came and picked up all the little shiny items, some of which had landed in my shoes or on the floor. He will also fix the box’s trim for me.

But what was the jewelry box doing way up in the closet? Well, I never found room for it on my dresser, and since I dress up very rarely these days, I put it up in the closet, squashed between two big plastic boxes of sheets (flannels for winter and cottons for summer).

I really should keep it on my dresser, where my perfume tray is. But I don’t have much space beyond the perfume tray, which is pretty large and covered with bottles, most of which I don’t use anymore but am emotionally attached to. Each one reminds me of a specific time in my life, so I rarely wear them, but I like the memory each brings back when I sniff one.

Clearly oversentimentality is at play here. I need to reduce the number of perfume bottles, put them on a smaller tray, and put that jewelry box on the dresser where it belongs. I will add that to my to-do list!

Will Clutter Accumulation Hit a Wall Soon?

Since the pandemic began, we’ve spotted flocks of delivery vehicles in our neighborhood. Whether it’s the bright white and blue FedEx vans, the darker blue Amazon vans, the white USPS vans or the brown UPS vans, they traverse our streets constantly, even on Sunday. All of them bring my neighbors (and me) an increasing variety of goods.

Never has accumulation been so easy! Before the advance of Internet shopping, you had to drive your vehicle to each store to load it up and bring stuff home. That required some work. And if you lived in a walkable city, as I once did, the amount of things you bought was limited by how much you could carry on the train or bus home, or on your walk home. You might see many things you liked, but you were limited by your arm strength.

These days we sit in a comfy chair at home and click on our phones (or tablets or laptops or desktops), and the burden of lifting what we buy is on the delivery people. This makes it so much harder to keep our homes uncluttered when the things that appeal to us are just a click away, and the only limit is our credit limit.

For now, anyways. Reports are everywhere that our supply chains are being greatly affected by the pandemic, by vaccine mandates and by the inability of companies to find workers. As a result, we’re told to expect delays and shortages of consumer goods for the foreseeable future, including the 2021 Christmas season.

That could certainly limit the amount of clutter we accumulate in the coming months.