Friday threatens storms
Jun. 6th, 2025 11:07 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
walkitoutBut M and I got a 10 am walk before it hit 80, altho boy was it humid.
R. brought down his Victorinox backpack roller from 2005 +/-. I wasn’t going to list it, and then I realized, Saying I Won’t List It is the beginning of a lot of, and then I listed it and hilarity ensued. So I listed it, and I warned off one of my regulars, and someone is supposedly coming by for the flashlights and expressed interest in the luggage so I figured I’d show it to him but warn him about the wobbly wheel and the worn all the way through parts. It would be perfect for schlepping tools around for a season, but that’s about all the life it has left in it. It could assist in a couple moves, type of thing.
Anyway. I picked it up, and it felt much heavier than it should have, so I opened it up (I’d taken pictures fairly mechanically and the weight hadn’t really registered at that point, at least not consciously. There was a bunch of stuff in there! Which is now on the dining table in the kitchen, waiting for R. to come in from mowing and decide what he would like to do with the stuff that was in there. Ziplock bags including the fancy kind for waterproofing on rides, a clip he uses to keep hotel curtains from having that annoying line of light down where they don’t quite meet, the travel knife in its plastic sheath, a cheap meat thermometer, lanyards. But also a Jansport backpack! A pretty decent one. I should list it, if he doesn’t want it, but he should know he’s getting rid of it, for sure.
I’ve got Big Plans for another chunk of decluttering discourse, that is about making personal metrics explicit. Right now, most decluttering discourse has explicit metrics (sparks joy, useful) and emphasizes that each person must declutter their own stuff, because no one knows anyone well enough to do this for them (not true in obvious edge cases, but these are books aimed at people with the power and will to throw away all the annoying stuff their spouse owns and they need to be warned away because of the probable consequences). The explicit metrics are not personal — and the personal metrics are not explicit.
I don’t know how much one can do with the sparks joy / is beautiful / charms / attracts etc. metrics. Those are Dark Part of the Brain things and making them explicit causes its own problems (Wants Don’t Have Whys). But the utility metrics could use some explicit attention. Is it useful TO YOU. Is it useful TO YOU NOW. WHEN will it be useful TO YOU. If you are keeping it for someone else, WHEN will it be useful TO THEM. Have they already told you that they don’t want it. Etc.
The discovery of a Kanga Room cord management thing that I bought yonks ago, and didn’t realize was still in the house, and which R. has no memory of using, is what made me realize that R. has a “is it useful” metric that doesn’t include “to me, in my future”. So if it WAS useful, it is “Useful”, even if it is not useful to him anymore and probably never will be again. I had no idea this was an issue, because it wasn’t hard moving along the kids clothes and stuff when they outgrew them. But he was very committed — as was I! — to not having more than 2, so maybe that provided an outsized dollop of clarity. Also, I had a path to the Next Kid that he could clearly see, which is very much the approach that is working now.
R. brought down his Victorinox backpack roller from 2005 +/-. I wasn’t going to list it, and then I realized, Saying I Won’t List It is the beginning of a lot of, and then I listed it and hilarity ensued. So I listed it, and I warned off one of my regulars, and someone is supposedly coming by for the flashlights and expressed interest in the luggage so I figured I’d show it to him but warn him about the wobbly wheel and the worn all the way through parts. It would be perfect for schlepping tools around for a season, but that’s about all the life it has left in it. It could assist in a couple moves, type of thing.
Anyway. I picked it up, and it felt much heavier than it should have, so I opened it up (I’d taken pictures fairly mechanically and the weight hadn’t really registered at that point, at least not consciously. There was a bunch of stuff in there! Which is now on the dining table in the kitchen, waiting for R. to come in from mowing and decide what he would like to do with the stuff that was in there. Ziplock bags including the fancy kind for waterproofing on rides, a clip he uses to keep hotel curtains from having that annoying line of light down where they don’t quite meet, the travel knife in its plastic sheath, a cheap meat thermometer, lanyards. But also a Jansport backpack! A pretty decent one. I should list it, if he doesn’t want it, but he should know he’s getting rid of it, for sure.
I’ve got Big Plans for another chunk of decluttering discourse, that is about making personal metrics explicit. Right now, most decluttering discourse has explicit metrics (sparks joy, useful) and emphasizes that each person must declutter their own stuff, because no one knows anyone well enough to do this for them (not true in obvious edge cases, but these are books aimed at people with the power and will to throw away all the annoying stuff their spouse owns and they need to be warned away because of the probable consequences). The explicit metrics are not personal — and the personal metrics are not explicit.
I don’t know how much one can do with the sparks joy / is beautiful / charms / attracts etc. metrics. Those are Dark Part of the Brain things and making them explicit causes its own problems (Wants Don’t Have Whys). But the utility metrics could use some explicit attention. Is it useful TO YOU. Is it useful TO YOU NOW. WHEN will it be useful TO YOU. If you are keeping it for someone else, WHEN will it be useful TO THEM. Have they already told you that they don’t want it. Etc.
The discovery of a Kanga Room cord management thing that I bought yonks ago, and didn’t realize was still in the house, and which R. has no memory of using, is what made me realize that R. has a “is it useful” metric that doesn’t include “to me, in my future”. So if it WAS useful, it is “Useful”, even if it is not useful to him anymore and probably never will be again. I had no idea this was an issue, because it wasn’t hard moving along the kids clothes and stuff when they outgrew them. But he was very committed — as was I! — to not having more than 2, so maybe that provided an outsized dollop of clarity. Also, I had a path to the Next Kid that he could clearly see, which is very much the approach that is working now.
Those are some important metrics!
Date: 2025-06-07 09:52 pm (UTC)Re: Those are some important metrics!
Date: 2025-06-07 10:40 pm (UTC)Weirdly, just today I used a zester (the Dream Farm one) that was the Sole Survivor of the Great Zester Purge. I don’t think we’d ever used it before moving along all the others, and keeping this one was Correct. It is absolutely amazing, and I never used it while the other ones were there. Now the drawer has much more space, is easier to find things in, closes better. And I’m using the good zester. I don’t know why I am this way. It’s so weird.
Anyone wondering why this zester is better: effortless, the pop clean thing really works, I don’t hurt myself using it or cleaning it by accidentally grating my skin off. It really gets the zest but leaves the white behind. Basically, does all the things you want from a zester and none of the other stuff that you don’t want. I’m looking at the Fluicer as a possible Recluttering choice.