Cleaning a Closet

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It goes like this:

First, you really have to get to a crisis point. By this I sometimes mean an eight-month-old sandwich; but I also mean not being able to find the single biggest thing you know is in there; trying to reach into it, your foot hitting a slope of plastic bags and clothing, and falling into your closet, at which point you are devoured by Christmas ornaments enraged that they were not on the tree this year.

Second, find a place of acceptance that everything must come out. Everything. By everything I mean this: everything.

It's good for your to understand the difference between linear and cubic feet. You can learn it as you moved everything from one tiny room to a bigger room.

Third: three piles and brutality. Keep, throw away, give away/donate. For that donation pile, keep in mind two things: just because it's going to Goodwill doesn't mean they want your garbage. A torn shirt is garbage. Scraps of fabric are garbage. A torn quilt is garbage.

Here's how you decide what to donate: imagine yourself having to defend every piece you give to the 'Will to an overworked donation worker. If you find yourself really believing you could answer "Well, someone's poor enough to appreciate a torn quilt," and mean it, and think I'm mean for saying so, you are a bad person, and the donation worker should be allowed to kneecap your ass.

Now you know that a lot of clothes and household items you want to donate are garbage. Goooood. They go into garbage bags, along with old papers, chewed paperbacks, 10-year-old sets of bath products, eight-month-old sandwiches, and so on.

If you're keeping it, have a place and a way to store it, or you'll be right back where you started.

Honestly, I'm surprised there were only two bags of donations, two bags of garbage, and a pile of boxes. It looked like a lot more all over my bed, and twice as much in the closet.

Why do you think you throw away garbage and donate the good stuff? So you have a place for your books, because that's what closets are for.

Happy 45th Birthday to Me!

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45! Pretty cool, huh?

After the fire, I thought I might not live to 43, I was so depressed. A very smart doctor made the first correct diagnosis of the nature of my depression and changed my life.

Last year at this time, my long time friend Dave Stevens died and I realized I didn't want to spend the rest of my life (or stb-ex's) making do in a relationship that depended on me accepting no affection, no passion, and a partner who found me unattractive in the name of "love."

I think Dave is a shithead for not telling me he was sick, but the way he regretted his life before he was sick, and how he lived it after was a real kick in the ass.

Last year at this time, I and my fellow Comic Book Tattoo contributors were blasting out the best work of of most of our careers, underneath the enthusiastic (or is that passionate? grin grin) leadership of Rantz Hoseley. I was doing my comeback work. We were in CBT Daylight Saving Time: we'd found out we had a month less than we thought. We all still fucking rocked that book. This is important because at this time last year I was completely vapor-locked on my CBT work because stb-ex was gringing about me taking back end pay, how long before I got money, why wouldn't I do insurance instead? In short, he really did not get how important CBT was and was going to be.

Dave died, I told stb-ex I was divorcing him (for the second time in six months), knew I was not going back, and I was able to work again.

This day two years ago, we moved back into the house. Unlike the day it burned down, which was a beautiful day weather-wise, it was raining. The house burned down on stb-ex's birthday and we moved back in on mine.

I've said it many times before, I'm saying it again, and will say it many more times: there is not a day that passes where I do not think of the generosity and love of strangers and friends, because it is constantly around me.

Thank you all.