someday he'll come along, the man i love

Hey guys.

It's Saturday night and since I'm broke, I'm staying in and moping about how complicated love is, and my poor spending habits. Boy, do I know how to party.

I meant to clean my house today but I'm pretty lazy when it comes to that sort of thing so I spent most of the day quilting instead. The bright side is that I actually almost finished one of my projects. Granted, it was one of the easiest ones, but it's in my stack of things-that-are-almost-done instead of the ever growing and toppling stack of things-that-are-going-to-be-so-awesome-if-and-when-I-finally-get-around-to-making-them. So that's as good for my soul as cleaning is. And once I got that to a nearly-finished point (just one more step but it's pretty time consuming so I'll wait for a movie) I actually did some cleaning too. I've been doing laundry all day and decided to fold everything and put it away and reorganize my drawers. I did this sometime last fall but after having a few parties and tiring of the clutter in between, I shoved some things in drawers and it kind of got messy again. When I reorganized my drawers last time, I put a whole heck of a lot of clothes in bags to give away (which I still haven't gotten around to, but I haven't looked back at what's in them; I don't really care anymore). I did some careful purging then and had 4 big bags full.

After being away from all my worldly goods save for what fits in one duffel bag for an entire month, I realized I really don't need all these clothes. Or even most of my other crap. I'm keeping my kitchen and books and craft supplies but everything else has got to go. Goodbye, old magazines (except for December back issues of Martha Stewart Living); goodbye, extraneous packaging (I'm consolidating all my stationery into just one box; ditto for beads, ribbons, sewing needles, and buttons); and goodbye unnecessary receipts, letters, and paid bills from five years ago. Hello shredder. I need more room for beautiful things and I need to do a little feng shui-style 'letting my chi flow' sort of stuff.

So I sorted and refolded all of my clothes while watching West Wing reruns on DVD (thanks Netflix!). My couch is overflowing with tidy stacks of like clothing and I'm having my own personal fashion show in the living room. Aside from necessary evils like Halloween costumes or fancy evening gowns, everything is going unless it meets ALL of the following criteria:

-fits
-flatters
-is comfortable
-makes me feel attractive
-is worn more than three times a year
-is in good repair
-can be worn with shoes I already own
-matches at least three other items in my closet (or jeans).

I am allowing myself a few pieces of clothing that don't *quite* fit right now since I am on a mission to be more fit, especially since I have nightmares about having fat arms in Michela's wedding photos. Shudder.

But I digress. Everything also will have to fit within my one (albeit huge) chest of drawers, or hang in the closet (and stay hung up, not on the floor, Abby!). I really do aspire to be a tidy person. It feels so good to clear out all sorts of unnecessary things from my life and focus on the things that actually matter - my friends and family, good books, good food, good surroundings, and good travels.

I made a budget for myself the other day and a travel fund was an imperative line item. This Scotland vacation was the first one I had taken in over two years that was anything more than a weekend. Totally unacceptable. I resolve to have more adventures.

It's funny, ever since I got back I have felt sort of mopey, like something is missing or not quite right - and frankly, something is missing, and something else is not quite right - but at the same time I just feel so optimistic about everything, about the little details that make life so grand. I don't really know what to make of it. Ah, but such is life. Who am I to complain?

I'm going to go finish my closet slash-and-burn, maybe watch Saturday Night Live. The world is my oyster.

I love you all.
McNabbs

p.s. Today's impeccable capitalization was brought to you by Folpmer, who makes me want to be a better person.