KonMari 2016 - The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up

[Deleted User]

I was out crafting all day yesterday and decided to get a WIP going again, stood up all day and was shattered but content. The conversation was, as always, very interesting bearing in mind that most are older than me and still in a couple, with one at home, several dealing with illnesses in one way or other. It got around to sorting `while you can` and a few saying that they were not going to do it, they would not know where to start. I didn`t say how well I have done, just that it was worth it and that it has taken over two years. The people on this thread are very much in the minority, most people have a head in the sand attitude and will be leaving it to other people to do the clearing, after the inevitable happens. A few have looked at Mcarthy homes and churchill and come away depressed at the lack of space and boltholes but still don`t de-clutter. Little do they know that it is likely that a house clearing company would come in and do the clean sweep, so the house can be sold for inheritance or care home fees. Better that we get the space benefit while we can

re the ashes, I dealt with them quickly, arranged to buy a tree fed by the ashes, in a new dedicated wood. Put a few under an old japanese acer in a large pot, which can be moved if I move and that is it. Good to deal with ashes quickly before it becomes too sentimental a possession to let go

No kondo today, just eating properly and a cycle ride and allotment and glad not to be on the roads

greent, I always find these old cathedrals and abbeys to be heart-stoppingly beautiful. Henry 8th has a lot to asnswer for

GreyQueen

Morning all.

Have had a lie-in, which is almost unknown for this early bird - 8.45 am!! And easing into the day as only have the strength for a few hours' gardening at a time so have decided to have the optimum warmth for it by going up about midday.

I'm at the two-thirds mark of what will be my probable lifespan but have been debiltated with CFS/ME since aged 20, and then racking up a life-threatening metabolic disorder a decade later. It's meant that it some ways, I've been old before my time.

Not looking old, I look about 8-10 years younger than my age, and I hope not being a fuddy-duddy, but old in the sense that I understand what it's like when the mind is willing and the flesh just cannot keep up, when even the everyday tasks take almost all the juice. And that I had that understanding when most of my peers did not, as they were in their prime and full of beans.

I think there is a fair amount of fantasising in our youth-obsessed culture in general, that old age and its inevitable difficulties and compromises, won't be applying to us. All that will be for those other people, people less bright and lively, less...... I don't know, less careful of their health etc. We'll be the exceptional ones who continue past 80 or 90 fit as fiddles and bright as buttons.

The trouble with fantasing is that reality doesn't give a damn what you think is going to happen, life just happens. Righteous living, allied with a good helping of luck (chiefly, choose your parents carefully) and favourable economic circumstances help, but don't change the facts that most of us will not pop off in our prime but will gradually lose vitality, health and strength.

Which is why, mes amies, it is important to keep on top of clutter and do a little whenever you can. And to have as much fun as possible while you can still get the cap off the gin bottle.:rotfl:

GoingToDoIt

Thanks GQ, very inspiring words! Whether it's this thread, time of life or other RL things, I've had a massive shift in my thinking recently, Over the past year or so.
I became ill with the CFS as a 20 something with a bright future and at the start of a "good career". As many of us do, I fought against the illness, refusing to be curtailed by it - we know how that ends up! But now, more than a decade on, and having done some living and learning my focus has shifted to "what do I want for this second half of my life?" I just want to make it simple, as it turns out!
I've achieved the career thing and am happy where I am. But am considering the future, perhaps something I can do from home or as my own business.
I'm not striving for a massive income leap, instead I'm assuming I'll always earn about this sort of money which is enough (if I don't start buying a lot of carp, it is enough!!!) I seem to have left behind the "bigger, better, more, something to prove" years and it feels really good. I am actually considering "the next ten years" and positioning myself for that and beyond, whilst many friends and people my age are getting married, buying houses etc which is a very different kettle of seafood to myself, and we have very different circumstances. But I feel that I am starting to do the right things for me, instead of the things I felt I should be doing and that feels good!

VJsmum

I think i might be in the "it won't happen to me" category.... But it's more of the dread of if / when it does rather than that it won't. I read a Bill Bryson book the other day where he said something along the lines of "this is as healthy as i am now going to be. it's all downhill from here" kind of thing... (he is about 10 years older than me. He said something that made me :rotfl: when he said that he was now even too old to get early onset dementia - any he gets will be the full-blown thing....

the reality is that my biological father (I have a stepfather who brought me up) died before he was 60 and my mum had chronic arthritis from under 40 and COPD from when she was early 60's. She died at 74. So my genes ain't great. Although both of them smoked and died of smoking related illness. I did smoke for about 5 years but gave it up in my mid 20's (I am 53), so let's hope... I do a little more than hope, though. I eat well and undertake moderate exercise with an active lifestyle so it's about all i can do.

OH and i were talking the other day about downsizing at some point when the kids have their own homes. OH was of the opinion that we don't need to - i will eventually persuade him that his idea to downsize is good :rotfl:

GreyQueen

GoingToDoIt, that sounds an excellent place to be; so many of us don't think about where we want to be, we allow ourself to be buffetted in any and all directions, like a sailboat with its sails up and no one at the tiller. I wish you every success in shaping your future.

VJsMum, perhaps you can sell OH on the downsizing concept as freeing up time, energy and money for fun activities, rather than in a negative sense of having too much to do and too many responsibilites as you age.

I've often remarked to myself how life is about backwards. When we're young and gadding about, if we own a car chances are its a banger and prone to breaking down. When we can afford a decent motor, we're too busy working all hours, or are retired and not so inclined to gad.

Regarding houses, one often sees the same phenomenon, as family people are crammed in close quarters with their children and Darby-and-Joan in their senior years can finally afford a decent amount of space (or have space freed up when the last Offspring takes the last of their truck away) and rattle around in it like two dried peas in a tin.

Yup, you can hire in help for house or garden, or you can think about downsizing into something more suitable, and spend the time and money saved having some superb holidays or whatever floats your boat (which may be a boat for all I know).;)

Righty, am very lazy today, got distracted with a Minimalist podcast whilst going thru some Stuff but will make my flask, drink the spare cup of tea in the pot and head out for a few hours' gardening.

VJsmum

Don't worry, GQ, in the end it will have been an excellent idea of his

Pooky

I've kondod my bathroom....literally. There's now bits of new bathroom all over the house....it's making me twitch.

Having just finished the electrics I'm now about to go fill some big holes and persuade the tools back into their right places before faffing with making the bath do what it's supposed to. I need to drain the heating system too as a small leak has been found that needs dealing with, ideally, whilst it's drained I'd fit the new upstairs radiators that I've been talking about for the past 5 years but if I get side tracked doing that then I can see my husband and daughters leaving home......although that's a tempting thought.

[Deleted User]

[QUOTE=GoingToDoIt;72443360._But_I_feel_that_I_am_starting_to_do_the_right_things_for_me,_instead_of_the_things_I_felt_I_should_be_doing_and_that_feels_good![/QUOTE]

I love that goingtodoit. I love an independent spirit who is not afraid to go her own way :T

I am enjoying the discussion, even now I do have moments of indecision but doing the pros and cons, I know I am best staying where I am. One of the main things for me is that I have a lovely allotment in an inspirational place, with skylarks and swallows. I could not live without my outdoor space, without the opportunity to scrabble on my hands and knees in the earth. I don`t want to live with old people, reminiscing about the past, going on coaches for a day out, dominos, shandies. I am still a free spirit but I have that deep down fear, that we all have, that we cannot turn the clock back. I suppose that doing the kondo is a kind of half way house, at least the main clearing is done, come what may and it means that we are prepared, in some small sense

Charis

I love the conversation here this afternoon. I'm thinking about this exact dilemma, having developed arthritis in my knees and hands which is now preventing me from doing a lot of the things I used to do without thinking. It's not so severe as to cause constant pain, but using stairs and lifting things, like I used to, now takes a lot of thought and planning. I struggle to get up and down stairs, which is embarrassing in a public place.

It costs me a lot to keep my bungalow and garden in reasonable order because I have to have paid help for garden tidying and anything involving plumbing, electrics, carpentry or climbing ladders. I'd like to sell up and buy somewhere with a smaller garden nearer to my sons, but while I have been here everything in the south east has shot up in price by comparison.

Like Kittie I don't fancy the dominos and raffles of an old people's complex but I realise that keeping this place is a big job on my own, even with help. My mother lived in one of those places and it was like that song Hotel California. 'You can check out any time you want but you can never leave' :eek: . When she developed dementia, the wardens couldn't tell me anything because they 'weren't allowed to without her consent' even though I was listed as her next of kin. It was difficult to keep tabs on her from nearly 200 miles away.

Comparing myself to my neighbours is scary. I am seeing them go one after another with dementia. Two more are showing the signs, repeating themselves or failing to recognise neighbours when they meet in the supermarket. They don't seem to die suddenly here, they simply fade away. Sometimes you only find out when the 'for sale' sign goes up and the skip arrives in the front garden.

GreyQueen

VJsmum wrote: »

Don't worry, GQ, in the end it will have been an excellent idea of his

:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

There speaketh a clever woman.

kittie, your remark reminded me of one of my great-aunties who says of some social occasions; I don't want to go there, it's full of old people!!

She's in her eighties but young at heart and much prefers the company of the younger generations to that of some of her peers.

I've long since decided I would never want to be in sheltered accomodation, due to the endless petty squabbles which infest these schemes. There always seems to be a Queen Bee (and/or a Top Dog) and their little coteries and the back-biting, social exclusion and rows about the right kind of outings seem to be unending. I even know first-hand of cases (relatives of friends) where people have been tormented to the point of severe ill-health by their peers who have far too much time on their hands and, in some cases, a level of emotional development comparable with pre-schoolers or the vilest kind of teen girl..

Nope, I want to be like the octogenarian lady I met a few years ago hostelling in New Zealand; she was travelling the world solo with a small rolling suitcase and was as happy as larry.

Have added six wheelbarrowfuls of barley grains and hops from the organic brewery to my New Courgette Bed, will let them cool down for a few days before turning them underground. And then took another two IKEYA blue bags to the tip, which means that another area of soil is now ready to be worked upon, yay!