Marriage is messy

I got married last year at the age of 35.  I have been on my own since I was 22.  I bought my house when I was 28.  I've been loading it with stuff ever since.  When I met Paul 4 years ago, he had a lovely apartment with lots of new furniture, a stocked kitchen, and an entire multi-media mega-center in his spare room.  When we got engaged, the madness of combining households began.  It sounds simple.  Ha.  First of all, we decided what to move into my townhouse, what to put into storage for a hypothetical future larger home, and what to just get rid of.  Then there was that limbo category.  Things that we didn't really know what category to assign that ended up in my house.  These miscellaneous items got put into various rooms, have been moved around, reorganized, moved from storage bin to storage bin, spare bedroom to office to basement to God knows where.  We've bought shelving units & Rubbermaid containers, cleaned out closets & donated to Goodwill.  Why is there STILL no room for our stuff???  We're not hoarders.  I watch the shows on TLC and A&E.  I know the symptoms.  We're not shopaholics.  I just don't understand where it comes from & what to do about it.  I think it multiplies. 

Then came all of the very beautiful & generous shower & wedding presents.  Another conundrum, but we love them all just the same.

Part of the problem is that Paul & I together make a horrible de-cluttering & organizing team.  We will look at a room full of stuff that needs to be organized & just freeze because we get overwhelmed.  We try to break down the larger task into smaller ones like we know we should, but we usually only get 1/4 of the way through before we just give out.  We lose focus.  We get anxious.  I take Xanax.  We lose patience.  One's crankiness will wear down the resolve of the other. 

One time last year, we actually took like 12 computers & 7 printers (ok, that's a small exaggeration) to the township recycling day.  Mind you, we still have like 8 computers in the house (another very slight exaggeration).  Electronics definitely multiply in this house, I swear to you.  Plus Paul is an IT professional, so people literally throw their ancient Apple II E's at him, expecting him to perform some sort of laying-on of hands to resurrect the 30-year-old dead motherboard.  Instead, these relics sit in our office for a year & collect dust before he tells them the bad news.  In his complete defense, he does not solicit these "side jobs."  In fact, he tries his best to avoid them at all costs. 

Anyway, lately I have been taking on very small chunks of this clutter & sorting, storing, tossing, and organizing.  It makes me feel like I'm slowly accomplishing something.  I'm sure that I'll still have a mess on my hands by the time we do move to a new house.  An uncluttered, organized, pristine house.  For a week.  Maybe 10 days.  :-)