messiness

I listened to most of an episode of Talking Books on CBC yesterday, as Phillip and I were driving home from my parent's house. "A Perfect Mess: the hidden benefits of disorder" by Eric Abrahamson and David H. Freedman was the book being discussed, and I think I would like to read it, if only to make myself more comfortable with the seemingly inevitable mess around me. I found it interesting that all of the guests described themselves as messy, as far as their workspaces were concerned - I think most people are, to varying degrees. One of the things that stuck out in my mind was that the universe was designed in an orderly way, but tends to chaos. Sounds just like my house! People fit into categories of truly neat and anal, peple having the appearance of neatness and order while the drawers are filled with mess (unfortunately, I think this is me) and messy people. I have two friends who pop to mind immediately when I think of people who have orderly minds. I find it interesting that one of them is also very orderly in her appearance and surroundings, while the other most definitely is not. I try to be orderly; I find it very calming. It's also nice to be able to find things when you need them, without a time-consuming hunt. While I love to have things organized, orderly, and easy to find, my mind is most definitely not. Especially these days, having the wee one around, I find it's like the jumble of tacks, elastics, erasers, post-its, paper clips in a desk drawer. Everything's piled together and it takes a bit of extracting in order to find what you need. Having said that, my desk at work is usually very neat, and I generally know where things are (paper clips are in one place, tacks in another). The car is tidy (canvas totes tucked neatly in the trunk), the bedroom is tidy, but I always feel as though I'm fighting "the mess", especially in the office-y room. These days, I'm starting to accept some of the mess, as I spend my time watching Phillip smiling and cooing. That makes just about everything better. At the same time, I can't wallow in clutter until he leaves home. Like everything else in life, I guess it's a balance; finding the right place on the continuum. Note the conspicuous absence of a picture accompanying this post; I'm not yet comfortable enough with my mess to share it with the world!