Getting rid of excess clutter is the first step with any move, especially when you’ve lived in your present home for a few decades.  But other than the obvious benefits of transforming my cluttered home into having a more pleasant abode that will eventually appeal to buyers, I am reaping additional rewards.

Let’s take my kitchen, for example.  There is a lot of stuff that I never use in the cabinets, including two shelves crammed with coffee mugs.  This is where Marie Kondo, the latest organizing guru, would tell me to pack them up in a box for donations, thanking each mug for its service then letting it go.  And while I was clearing out shelf number 2, there it was!  A wonderful old friend that brought me joy for years until it vanished.

Yes, my Allenwood Penitentiary mug!  It was a gift from a favorite old housemate.  Back in the day, he took a road trip to Allenwood to interview a bad guy for one of his magazine pieces.  When he got there, a perky young PR woman met him at the gates, and as part of the visit, she insisted he stop by the Allenwood gift shop. Yes.  This federal penitentiary has a gift shop. And he brought me the coffee mug.   As I recall, the gift box had a goofy logo on it that included a seal saying something like, “If you’ve got the time, we’ve got the place” around an emblem.

Getting my old friend back and having a tidier, more organized kitchen are two of the rewards of my labors.  When it’s finally time to list my house, there will be additional payback!

It’s spring in the Year of De-Cluttering, and I’m taking it pretty seriously.  This is the first step in moving from a house that is too big and too needy to be the ideal living situation for me.  And right now, when an absolutely perfect condo comes along (and at least one comes along every week), I have to let it go or find a real buyer to sell it to!