Laundry

Some of you live a very organized and compartmental life. Some of us definitely do not. I was chatting with a customer in the lobby today and she sounded much like myself in regards to our organizational problems. Not only are we female so our minds run in all directions at any given moment and on any subject, but the both of us have very much our own organizing systems. In fact, she told me that her sister was so clean and organized she had a basket in the doorway organizing thing that was just for her.

So all this discussion led us to chatting and then I think I realized how funny we might seem to others. My room, though very much organized to me is perhaps not really under the category of organized. I really love things to be clean but sometimes my lack of official organizing and my ability to get overwhelmed when things don't seem organized can cause me some difficulty in this. Let me give you one example. It takes me forever to get laundry completed or so it seems because I have a very specific way that I do it. It usually does not get done often as I can't stand doing loads in between because I want it all done a certain way and to ensure that process must spend time at home with it. All of my laundry gets sorted first by color. Now from what I hear normal people just sort colors and then whites. I am not going to claim normalcy here but I will claim consistency.

I literally sort by color shades. Pinks and reds go in one section along with a certain tone of brown. Beige and yellow shades in another pile. Blues and some greens are allowed to be in pile three. Then of course there are blacks and then the pile of whites. I try to fit everything in these 5 sections. Then depending on the size of the section I may also sort out by textures and dark or lighter shades. For instance, blue shirts I usually wash together but blue jeans only get washed with other jeans. Or pink t-shirts may not be washed with pink work shirts that are lacy or of nicer fabrics. Then, after each load is finished it is time to pull it out of the dryer before it even has time to wrinkle as I dislike ironing more then you know. In fact I have ironed one thing in the last five years and it was a pattern I was ironing on a shirt.

Next is the putting away process. If I am being very lazy it will get draped across my desk as folding can create wrinkles. Then when it is time to put it away I have a very specific way to do that as well. Most people probably put things in their closet by the item it is. You know-shirts all together and then pants or some order like this. All the things I hang up are organized and my non-hang-up items go in specific places with no organization at all. So, when I hang things up they go from dresses in the back to jackets at the other end with all the rest in between (tank tops, skirts, pants, shirts, jackets, coats). But from this point I also organize by color and type. Like my shirts for instance. There are many types of shirts and many different colors. I tried organizing about a month ago just by color and not by type but I hated it and went back to my old system. So shirts get organized first by style; t-shirts, stretch t-shirts, babydoll, non-cotton, short-sleeve collared, and then collared. Then they are sorted by color. So I may have only one pink baby doll shirt but if I have a red it may be near the red. You would never find a pink by a green by a black by another green as that would be utter closet chaos.

So all in all you may now be thinking I am crazy or that I am actually very organized. In reality that is so not the truth though I try desperately. Me and my customer actually had a very funny chat about that problem this morning. I joked about needing a husband someday who has a great sense of focus, direction, and organization (not to mention about a thousand other qualities I don't have. )We both have a very bad habit of leaving stuff in random places (which are not random to us) around the house or in other peoples houses. I am famous for having something of mine at each of my friends houses and perhaps not realizing it till I am looking for it later. Also, when I have not been off for a week or spend time cleaning you can follow my circle. It's not necessarily a messy trail, but just some strategically located items located around the house. So when I leave I must go through this trail to make sure not only that I am fully dressed for public (that is another story as I once made it out of the house one morning forgetting I had only a tank top and flip-flops on which is not too strange except when your on your way to work....at a bank. I had forgotten my make-up and my jacket and nylons and had to run back inside ) but also that I have hit all the important spots. So in conclusion I will just say we had a great conversation in which we could not only relate but also laugh over.