still cleaning my room

so, all right. i still haven’t finished cleaning my room, it’s still as uninhabitable as the day we got back from the states a couple of months ago. i’ve started a couple of weekends back. so far, i’ve already taken out two big garbage bags of junk, a pile of paper a few feet high for recycling, and a huge garbage bag full of clothes for garage sale or hand me downs, but my room still looks the same.

it’s frustrating and discouraging work. seriously. because i would spend hours sweating and sneezing amidst the dust bunnies and cobwebs sorting through the stuff that i still refused to let go when i last went through my things (about a couple of years ago) and my room would still look as cluttered as ever. I wonder how people can go through life without being overwhelmed by the stuff that they’ve accumulated throughout the years? How do they know which ones to let go and which ones to keep? I still have a hard time letting go of most things that i know i don’t need anymore (both literally and figuratively).

it’s really amazing, finding mementos from a decade back. i’ve already forgotten most of the things that they’re supposed to remind me about, sometimes they brought back memories so vividly that i had to think twice before tossing them into the trash bag or give away pile.

i found a dress that i bought for my high school graduation hanging in the dark recesses of my closet, and my sablay from my university graduation. i finally let go of that shirt i wanted to wear again as soon as i had lost weight. it’s funny how some articles of clothing had memories attached to them that sometimes i hesitated to let them go.

there are piles and piles of letters from friends whom i haven’t heard or seen in years. there were the loveletters that i had no hesitation burning on my dad’s barbecue grill. no ceremony for them, i just wanted to make sure i would be free from the memories of that particularly disastrous relationship. i kept all the post cards, letters from my mentor back in highschool, a few notes from my friends that encouraged me, and those cut-out symbols of appreciation that i got from nearly every camp i had attended in the past ten years.

don’t even get me started on books.which ones to put in the bottom of the box? which ones i might decide to read again next week? which ones i know i would never read again? and who does this book belong to again?

after picking through another box of stuff last night, i found a letter i wrote to myself in 1997 (see previous post) and at first, i found it encouraging– that what i had told myself back them still holds true now. but after a while, a question crept up into my head, “what have you done in the decade in between that letter and now? you knew already back them what you wanted, how come you’re starting again now?” and all the memories of the shameful things i had done in the past ten years flooded back and tormented me, making me forget that i had been forgiven of them already.

I told my mom that i don’t know how to clean up my room. or i just don’t have any place to put all my stuff in. i need a trunk, shelves, a bigger closet and a bureau of drawers. plus the air-tight plastic storage things under my bed (raised 6-inches higher off the floor with the platforms i got from ikea for extra room).

One thing I found out through all this is I still haven’t gotten the hang of letting go. I’ve been working on my room since I’ve graduated from college. I think one of the reasons why my room still looks the same is that i start by emptying the envelopes and boxes, working my way outwards. I can’t just throw whole boxes of stuff away, i have to go through them, sift through the detritus and decide stuff i can do with and without. Then i need places to put the stuff i keep. I like the idea of a clutter-free room (and life), i just don’t like the part of wading through all the stuff and dust and memories of the past decade so I could decide which ones i wouldn’t need anymore and the ones that I would need to remember later on.

Cleaning my room is a seemingly unending excavation into the past in the light of the present and my perceived future. And like I said, and still believe, once I got my room in order, my life would be too. (I sure wish there’s a Savior for rooms too…)