Clutter by Linda Stowe
Most days I spend 4-5 hours watching videos and listening to podcasts about politics and current events. This keeps me informed about what’s going on in the world, but today I just wasn’t in the mood to hear about the situation in Israel or Trump’s legal situation. Today I wanted something different.
So, I have just spent four solid hours watching videos about cleaning. I’m not talking about cleaning dishes or washing clothes. These were videos made by this guy who specializes in decluttering. I saw him go through the living spaces of compulsive spenders and hoarders. Rooms that were so jammed with boxes and items that there was no space to walk, let alone sit. Beds and furniture piled high with clothes, most unused. One woman had five one-gallon jugs of vinegar and two large tubs of just spices, yet she never cooked. Another had so many clothes it took them seven hours to fold them all and most of the items still had store tags on them. All the knick-knacks and appliances. My mind is numb with the mounds of stuff these people had accumulated. I thought, these are people whose behavior I cannot understand. Then I thought, what if every podcast or video I had watched over the years were a physical item, how cluttered would my own house be?
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Polly here. Minimalist Polly. I like the sparse. I like things clean and uncluttered. Reading Linda’s piece made me wonder what “clicks” or “unclicks” in someone’s mind to make them behave this way. And yet? I have OCD. So, something went the other way in my brain.
But the most poignant part of the story was Linda’s last musing. It all comes down to this. We all have our own “things” that we can identify as our quirks. While some of us may have more idiosyncrasies than others, I think we all probably have a “something” that can be considered a peculiarity.
We may not be able to understand someone else’s behavior, like hoarding, or repetitive cleaning, or holding their breath when they drive through a tunnel; we should always remember that other people may not understand our quirky thing. And as such, we should always try to be compassionate toward others.
For we can never know what it is like to be in someone else’s skin.
Clutter By Linda Stowe
