Perhaps you have a "put it" place where you hide things when company is coming or when you just need to clear off the table for supper. After her children left home, Randy's mother had a "put room." I often grab an empty laundry basket for bigger pick-up jobs then take it to the garage where it stays till the guests leave. But on a regular basis I put papers on our roll top desk then close it up. Once upon a time I actually sat at the desk and worked, but lately it's been covered with stacks of papers, as has the desk to the left of my computer in our office. So last week I decided it was time to change that, to reclaim the dining room table for eating only and make space on my computer table. I carried the piles of papers to the coffee table and began sorting. Some things were immediately put into the blue recycling bin, others went into current file folders, and still others into new files. Were there any surprises? Well, to give you an idea of how long things have been accumulating, I found an issue of the San Francisco Chronicle from 21 Jan 2009 with the headline "The World Has Changed," Barack Obama's inauguration edition. There were birthday cards from years ago. Scraps of paper with titles of books I want to read and thought-provoking quotations. Magazine articles to read. Photographs of my step-mother's grandchildren and the quilt she made and other family members. The stack of paper by the computer held mostly genealogy-related papers, family group sheets, articles about Kentucky, memorabilia like report cards, my 9th grade English class notebook, and more.
After several hours of work spread over several days I had taken care of nearly everything, at least enough to reclaim the coffee table and to vacuum the living room. I really try not to let this accumulation happen, but somehow after a while the papers pile up again. Maybe this time I will succeed in consistently keeping paper under control!
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