Kilroy was here.

I think I have discovered something in Chronic Disorganization I will call the
“Kilroy Was Here Syndrome.”

Discovered in myself first, quite by chance, I think it can only happen if you live in a house with other people, but I might be mistaken, since I’ve never lived in a house without other people.

Let me tell you my story.

I came out one morning to our nice clean kitchen. (I’d like you to believe it is that way every morning, but alas, the kitchen is one of my own personal issues.) I was happy that the Messy Fairies had left it alone overnight. I was the first one up, and I had used a water glass. As I was about to go through my self-questioning (Do I leave it out? Do I put it in the dishwasher right now?), I was thinking that if I put it in the dishwasher (as my Organizer Fairy was urging me to do), wouldn’t my spouse be proud of how conscientious I had been by putting it away right then?

And then another, more sinister thought (must have been from the Messy Fairy) entered my head. “If I put this glass away, he will not notice that I have put it away. He will not realize that I was even in the room. He will only notice that I have been in the room if I leave the glass out!

For a moment, I almost decided to leave the glass out! (I didn’t—I put it in the dishwasher.)

But it made me wonder about myself and my clients. Are we sometimes messy because we subconsciously (or unconsciously—I’m never sure which) want someone, anyone, to know that we have been there? Our own little “Kilroy Was Here” graffiti that confirms our existence to others.

It was a surprising thought, true at least for me.

When I see a mess my precious daughter has left behind, I try not to get angry, but remember that it is because we have a child (something we had really, really wanted), that we now have a mess in the house, or a toy tossed here or there. Shall I choose to look at it as another mess to clean up left by my ungrateful daughter? A task to remind my child about when she gets home? Or simply a token of her existence for which I am grateful every day, and I can easily and quickly swoop it up and put it where it needs to go? (With a smile on my face thinking about the day she was born, or the wonderful drawings she’s always making for us.)

The same can be said for things a spouse leaves behind—socks here and there, a towel on the floor, a dish out of place. I am often reminded of letters to Dear Abby and Ann Landers from widows who would give anything to have these messes back in the house if only their husbands were still there, too.

Now, that's not to say that I'm not teaching my daughter to clean up after herself (she's only in first grade, we have years left to work on it!) or that I'll excuse my spouse's messiness every time. But it does mean I'll try to lighten up on myself and the tapes I play in my head when I confront a mess--mine or theirs. I can also choose to still be conscientious about cleaning up after myself and still find ways to leave my mark. Cutesy things are fun and easy--a note in the lunch box, or the bathroom mirror. Or just a hug when they get home and an easy, "I love you, and I'm so glad to see you."

I can remember which "mark" I want them to see and how they might be thinking of me when they see it. Just as easily as I can choose which thoughts I will think when I see their "marks."

Have a great week!

Margaret was here.

(Clink the links on either today's title or the graphic to learn more about the original "Kilroy Was Here" drawing. He was quite popular during WWII and there are a number of legends, myths and information about how he came to be.)

Prozac Nation?

When helping to organize a client's house, we often come across old medicines. What to do with them? The old answer used to be to flush them down the toilet or simply put them in the trash.

Please don't do either of these things!

These chemicals are finding their way into our water sources and then of course into our bodies. Municipal filtration systems do not keep them out. The result, of course is that we all have traces of drugs (ones not prescribed for us) in our systems. This means that even nursing mothers are passing this stuff onto their precious babies. It certainly gives a new meaning to the phrase "Prozac Nation!" Let's keep our children and ourselves safe and dispose of old medications properly.

In my neck of the woods, local pharmacies are participating in a pilot program collecting old pills. I've listed these in this blog, but if you don't live in Sonoma County, California, please contact your local Waste Management agency or your local pharmacy and ask about what's available for you. If there is nothing---please start bugging your local government to start doing something!

(Be sure to remove labels before you recycle the bottles. This will help protect your identity and medical information.)

Santa Rosa:
Creekside Rx
Dollar Drug
Longs-4th St., Mendocino and Stony Point
The Medicine Shoppe
Rite-Aid-Farmers Lane
Tuttle's Hoen and Doyle Park Rx's
Walgreen's --All Santa Rosa Stores

Sebastopol:
Safeway
Longs

Rohnert Park:
Longs on Commerce
Costco

Cotati:
Walgreens-Old Redwood Highway

Program guidelines:

1. No lotions or creams.
2. Some pharmacies recycle the bottles with labels removed. Others ask you to take them home and recycle them.
3. This is a pilot program running from February thru July.

You can also take meds to the Sonoma County Waste Management Facility. The Household Toxics Facility is open every week for free drop-off of toxics from Sonoma County residents.

Call 543-4200 or visit www.srcity.org/safemed for more info.

Margaret's 4 Basic Organizing Tips

If you do nothing else in your life, do these 4 things to get organized.

1. Hang your purse and keys on a hook by the door.

2. Purge your clothing. Then again. Then 6 months later, again.

3. Use a day planner--and keep it with you. At the most, use only 1 more calendar in the house at your desk or on a wall for the family to see. Keep them both updated.

4. Practice this phrase "Let me check my calendar and get back to you." Then be sure to use it before you say yes to anything or anyone!


Do these 4 things, and I promise that you will see a change in your life!

Margaret

'Ware oh 'wear has all my clutter gone? Oh 'Ware, oh 'wear can it be?
(Two easy steps to reducing dirty piles.)

No, those are not typos. (Or "typoes" if you are Dan Quayle.)

In one of my tip sheets entitled "Riding the Laundry Cycle," I make mention of purging your clothing in order to simply have less of it around to wash. It's a simple idea, really and I'm going to take it a step further to help you build the habit of doing the laundry on a routine schedule.

Certainly, if you have less laundry, you will have fewer clothes that must be washed--you will be forced to do laundry much sooner if you don't have 365 outfits and try to do 52 loads of laundry on New Year's Eve. But I can help you get to the washer much sooner.

What usually makes you start a load?

Underwear? Yep, that's most people's answer. And how many pairs (lets just count the "shorts" for men and "panties" for the ladies) do you own? If it's more than 8, you could be in trouble.

In college, I had the unfortunate luck to overhear another student say she owned 30 pairs, and therefore only had to to laundry once a month. I thought that was a grand idea. (Kind of OK for a college student, but it wasn't working for me 15 years later.)

Why not limit yourself to 7 or 8 pairs? Having eight lets you do laundry once a week while still wearing one pair. (Nice, especially if you use a laundromat.) A client kindly pointed out that you would need to have an equal number of light/white and dark pairs for this to work should you decide to do laundry more than once a week and presort (as I suggest) the lights from the darks. Or have 8 that are all light or all dark.

Yes, (talking mostly to the ladies here) you can still have some of those "special" (read "pretty but not so comfortable") sets, but you must promise not to wear them once your "everyday" stuff is dirty or you'll be back to where you started. With too many loads to wash in your one or two precious days off.

So, that's the "Wear." Now what about the "Ware" you ask?
Tell me now about another area of the house where stuff stacks up to be washed....

Yep, the kitchen. We're talking about dinnerWARE and silverWARE now. The same rule applies here.

Limit how many of these things you have in your kitchen and can use before you are forced to load up (or eek, wash by hand) the dishwasher and run it. One summer I worked in Yosemite and had a tiny little space to myself and no dishwasher. I took with me only 2 plates, 2 glasses and 2 sets of silverware. If company was coming, heck, they were told to bring their own. (Having more than 2 people in this "space" was hard enough anyway!) It was so easy to just get in the habit of cleaning my ware right after using it. And of course, putting it all away was a breeze, too!

Now, I'm not saying you must limit yourself to 2 items, but do think about limiting what you keep on hand what you might use at one meal, or maybe in one day if there are only one or two people in your household. You don't have to toss your other dishes or silverware, but put them away in an inconvenient place so you will only get them out when company is coming. But if you have 89 spoons and tend to use them all before you do the dishes, then you are surely in need of a sort and purge day.

So, just limit your Wares/Wears and you will be on the road to starting new habits that reduce the messy-dirty-giant-pile/stack-needs-to-be-washed clutter in your home.

Chronic Disorganization, ADD and Hoarding, Oh My!

October was the month of conferences and I'm glad we'll be heading into the quiet weeks of just major family holidays!

It was actually the end of September when I attended the NSGCD (National Study Group on Chronic Disorganization) Annual Conference in Mt. Laurel, NJ. We had two main wonderful speakers whose expertise was in ADD and people who hoard. Both areas are such huge issues right now in the field and it was great to hear the most up-to-date information. Among the attendees, we realized that collaborative therapy (client, therapist and organizer) is the way to go with our clients in great need. We'll be bringing this message to the world of therapists and coaches in the next few years! On a personal (and professional) note, I sat for my Level III peer review and received my official CPO-CD (Certified Professional Organizer in Chronic Disorganization) title and lapel pin. Sixteen months of study and mentoring have come to a close! And yet the work continues....

Conference #2 was the ADDA Regional Conference in San Francisco. (Attention Deficit Disorder Association) Again, more wonderful information about adult ADD.

Conference #3 just wrapped up this last weekend in San Ramon. The NAPO-SFBA (National Association of Professional Organizers-San Francisco Bay Area) held their regional conference. I co-presented a session with colleague Kim Anker-Paddon (soon to be of the LA area) on ADD with a twist. We called it "Nature and Nurture: It all A.D.D.s up!" Kim spoke on the "traditional" organizer ways to help our clients with ADD (or AD/HD--same thing) and I spoke about some new ideas I am using about how nature and other natural methods can help people focus. (Some great studies have been done by Stephen Kaplan and Andrea Faber Taylor and Frandces Kuo.) I'll write more about these ideas and studies soon.

I actually passed on another great conference in SF--the Mental Health Association's Hoarding and Cluttering Conference. There just wasn't enough time for me to attend this one, but Kim did and she said it was wonderful. I attended last year and heard Randy Frost speak. He is one of the authors of the new book "Buried in Treasures: Help for Compulsive Acquiring and Hoarding." Also a must-read for anyone who has this issue or has a loved one with hoarding problems. The problem is more widespread than anyone can imagine--and such a heartache for all involved. Marin County is starting a task force on the situation.

Well, there is certainly enough fodder in my last month of conferences to blog daily for quite awhile. Please tune in soon for more detailed information about all the topics mentioned today.

Have a Happy (and safe) Halloween!
Margaret,