Downsizing, Phase 2: The Last Mile

 

1/22/25 Caffe Ladro, Roosevelt neighborhood

“Seeing the light at the end of the tunnel” should be the appropriate cliché for the current stage of my downsizing project: I really am near the end of Phase 2 (moving into my new studio/office). But in the back of my mind is some other kind of adage, or maybe it’s a parable, math story problem, logic trick or some other such nonsense that I’ve heard but can’t quite remember or articulate. It’s something about how you divide the distance between here and there in half. When you get to the middle, you divide the remaining distance again by half. Repeat and continue, and you get closer and closer to your destination but never arrive. Or perhaps the cliché I’m really looking for is “the last mile is the longest.”

Ready for the Gab & Grab!

Nonetheless, I managed to fill six cartons with art materials for USk Seattle’s annual Gab & Grab (we had a special Black Friday edition last year, but typically we do only one each winter). I probably could have filled more, but I ran out of time, and I was satisfied that I had at least purged every category once. When I put everything out for the Grab tomorrow, I will try to remember to take photos!

Since at least one reader has expressed interest in hearing my criteria for purging, I’ll try to articulate that now. The first pass was easy: Anything I knew was of poor quality or a duplicate, out it went. (If the quality was so bad that I would be embarrassed to give it to a friend, it went into the Goodwill box.) Also easy were lots of materials I had used once to review for the Well-Appointed Desk but knew I would not use again.

That’s as far as I went for smaller categories. For my largest categories – colored and graphite pencils and related erasers, sharpeners and other accessories – I had to take a second pass, which was harder. I have a vast accumulation of “OK” products that I might use again with varying degrees of satisfaction. But given how many superior products I also have (the ones much better than “OK”), would I ever really choose to use those that are simply OK? Do I ever reach for them now? The answer was clear (but it was painful because I had so many in that category).

Finally, I have quite a few pencils and pencil sets that I would put in the “novelty” category. They had no purpose beyond initially amusing me, and much as I hated to admit it, the amusement was short-lived (I suppose that’s the definition of novelty). If it no longer brings joy or purpose, out it went.

Though it was a painful, tedious process, I’m happy to say that most of what I’m left with are products of the highest quality or simply products that both give me joy and have purpose. Some items, of course, are beyond purpose yet still bring joy – certain “collectible” pencils. Although I purged many of those, too (such as pencils that other people decided I needed to have in my collection but that I didn’t actually collect myself, or duplicates), I kept many favorites.

When I eventually move out of this house, I’ll have to make yet another cut, which will be more severe still. But I’m optimistic that I’ve made a deep enough cut this time that it won’t be too bad in terms of volume (as long as I don’t add to the accumulation during the years in between!).

In my Jan. 15 sketch journal page (below), there’s a reference to the hall cabinets. Although technically not part of downsizing, I had a new cabinet built to fill a large hole that had been in the hallway the past 20 years (details in the photo cutlines below). It was much harder than I had expected to find a cabinetmaker who would custom-build it to match the original cabinet above it – everyone wants to plug and play! The new cabinet doubles my space for linens and sundries, so I no longer have to go upstairs for some of those items.

1/15/25 Third Place Commons

Before filling the new cabinet, I took everything out of the old cabinet, tossed some old linens and especially a ton of sundries I have no intention of using. I mean stuff like old shampoos and soaps (tried but didn’t like them), expired medications, hair clips and ties from when I had long hair, on and on and on! I found a whole box of different colors of shoe polish and leather-treating products that Greg must have used decades ago when he wore shoes that could be polished! Clearing all that junk out and organizing the stuff I actually do use was almost as satisfying as clearing out my studio. Imagine opening a cabinet and being able to grab a fresh toothbrush or spool of floss without digging!

AFTER: 20 years later, "someday" finally came!
I had a cabinet built to match the original. 
Since we had saved the original drawers,
I was able to reuse the knobs. Now they all match.

BEFORE: Drawers in the lower space had to be
destroyed 20 years ago to gain access to 
plumbing for the adjacent bathroom. We just
covered the hole with a sheet of MDF until 
"someday" when we would fix it.