It all started because of some leaves in the foyer…

I was working upstairs, diligently tapping the keys on my laptop, multi-tasking like a mad woman, iPad open and brain divided into the many open tabs inside.

So, when I heard the vacuum downstairs, it took me a minute to realize what I was hearing. And since the house cleaning fairies hadn’t stopped by lately, I only had one guess….Mac was vacuuming.

Now, you might immediately think that is a wonderful thing, and while it is indeed wonderful, it’s also a time for me to reflect, to think clearly and to make sure I have a plan and not be sidetracked by a hastily hatched move.

You see, Mac is an engineer. He’s also a perfectionist. I had to make SURE I didn’t disrupt the feng shui of his vacuuming chore, the one where he moves all the furniture, vacuums behind the baseboards (kidding…sorta) and grabs every wayward spider web before it’s even thought about in tiny spider brains. He vacuums the curtains, the pillows, the shelves, and anything else that even remotely resembles a vacuum-able surface. My dog and cat hide when he gets out the big giant sucking machine, because they’ve come too close one too many times.

I’m……not quite that particular. I vacuum. But I rarely move more than the dog, cat and 2 footstools and that’s on good days. So you can understand why I didn’t want to interrupt his mission. I waited until I heard him vacuuming the other room before I went downstairs, and for good measure, I grabbed the sheets off the beds to wash ~ I can surely pull my weight, but it’s not vacuum weight I pull. I’m a laundry, kitchen and closet girl.

It’s important to know your strengths.   I should put that on a resume sometime.

I gingerly stepped over the vacuum cord, careful not to disturb the vacuum master, and headed to the laundry room (otherwise known as our bathroom with the washer and dryer included). Sheets in and other clothes folded, I went to our closet to put stuff away.

I might have gotten distracted by the empty hangers. Or it could have been the 3 skirts laying on the bed that I walked by as I headed to the closet. Then again, it could have been the scarves on the closet door.

Whatever it was that triggered my brain to charge into the closet and start pulling out clothes, straightening hangers and organizing everything by TYPE didn’t bother to surface or show it’s ugly head again. And really, that didn’t matter. I was in DEEP. An hour passed before I even knew what was happening and I had a pile of clothes on the bed….summer clothes to go in storage, clothes I wouldn’t wear again for donation and a few clothes that I just needed to throw away.

One thing you need to remember is that our house was built in 1860. And in 1860, the houses didn’t have closets, mainly because people had 2 dresses, 1 pair of shoes and a bonnet and they could fit all that in a drawer. (And each room was taxed…included closets!)

But, thankyoubabyjesus, whoever remodeled the condemned house we now call home, added a closet in the master bedroom. It’s still small, but at least it’s not a drawer. Because….HELLO! A DRAWER!

Now, I have to believe a man remodeled our house, because…did I mention the closet was small? Yep, like really small. And since I really REALLY like shoes, I had to figure out a way to store them all. So I kept all my shoes in the box they came in and stacked them on 2 shelves in the closet.

Is it a pain? Why, yes it is. But, I know what shoes are in what box, and I can usually scan, grab, open, and slide back in any box when I need shoes.

And then Murphy showed up…you know Murphy, right? He wrote some laws….

Now, let’s get back to the story: I was in CLOSETFIX mode. I had an arm FULL of clothes, and I was DONE. I had everything organized by type (I had to be organized in ONE part of my life and I bet God is laughing because it’s by Type of Clothes???), the empty hangers pulled out and in a box for the cleaners, and all the scarves on the scarf hanger.

As I was backing out of the closet, a hanger (or my butt…but let’s go with hanger) caught the edge of a shoe box. As that one shoe box started to fall, I watched in slow motion as the domino of boxes started to tilt, sway gently and crash to the floor, spraying pumps, clogs, sandals and flip flops all over the closet.

Boxes and lids were everywhere, with no matching shoes side by side. It looked like a tetris game had exploded and landed in my closet. I even saw a flip flop get stuck in the sleeve of a jacket (but by snappers, it was neatly hung with the other jackets, all in a row).

It was a big crash, and I just stood there, surveying the mess in my newly cleaned closet, arms full of tank tops and shorts, trying to decide what to do.

And THAT’S why, on a Saturday at 4:00 pm, I’m having my FIRST glass of wine…..

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This was originally posted on my Facebook Page on 10/15/16