On possessions

The most recent self-rejuvenation e-book my parents are reading is requiring them to make a list of all of their possessions. I think it’s part of Chapter Six on understanding how your consciousness is ruled by your possessions. Thankfully, they remark, they have far less fewer possessions as a result of my dad’s perpetual campaigning for donations for Goodwill.*

As a disturbingly time-intensive manisfestation of my Virgo moon, I, too, am undergoing a dramatic renovation to my life. It involves a new cabinet for my yarn (now untangled!! (mostly)), actual effective organization of my art supplies, an eventual closet retrofit, and, most importantly, an elaborate new filing system. I decided to go with the brightly colored hanging file folders and the matching letter sized 1/3 cut files. Yellow makes you wanna clean.** And green is the perfect color for my Botany & Landscaping file.

Erin says to me the other day, pointing to my banker’s box of paper to file, “Why don’t you just set a torch on the whole thing?”

“But you see, an independent sales representative needs to track her expenses.” And it’s true.

But really, does your everyday independent sales representative need a hanging file for every long term friend? Cause I do. I am so unable to part with love letters, paintings, old Kingman social surveys, et cetera. Everyone’s file will be complete with an internal organizational structure dividing the memorabilia into Photos, Postcards, College Notes & Homework, whatever.* There will probably have to be a more general Misc. friends: 1995-2000. I’m not even sure everyone will get their own internal folder within that category. Hopefully.

This filing system solves so many of my problems. Today, for instance, I came home to a bank statement. With my new filing system–after opening and giving it a quick run down to assure its accuracy–I can just stick it in the Co-op section of Banks. I’ve recently realized that I make a penny a month on the $45.00 I deposited in the Young Savers Bank Account I started my first year of college. I’m at $45.47 now! Before my recent organizational triumphs, that bank statement would have stayed on my desk for months–years, even. And it’d never have gotten past that fated bankers box.

The filing system not only solves the problem of the perpetual influx of paper (I even have a hanging folder for Ongoing Legal Difficulties!), but it’s also educational. I’ve already begun to look at my bank statements in a new way (i.e., at all); but as destiny will have it, I will finally have easy access to many of the resources my friends and family provide. A Mom file–for instance. A place where I can store her account of the differences of brain neurochemistry between men and women according to whoever wrote that Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus book for easy access. Did you realize–?

Here I was going to provide a real world instantiation of how understanding these differences in neurochemistry can help us all understand both our and others’ behavior. But I haven’t made the Mom file yet, so I think I put her summary back in the Need to File box.

* Hmm…are those donations tax deductible? Are the broken computer parts I left in the co-op free pile tax deductible? No, seriously. Please, can someone tell me where I can get my actual tax questions answered? Is it bad for me to deduct as expenses nearly 4/5 of my total reported income in sales this year?!
** According to me, on why my yellow PVA mop is better than the competitor’s otherwise identical green PVA mop. It’s amazing how much the color of a mop head can confuse the general public!
*** The actual internal divisions will be determined on a case by case basis. And I’ve tried to give g. back that problem set from CS61C, but she doesn’t want it. Even though she got 100%. I have a folder for A Papers. I guess maybe I could give her a subsection of that one.