January is my favorite magazine month

I feel like I have so much I want to tell you! It’s been hard to decide where to begin.

This sort of echoes my general, near-constant state of attempting to “catch up,” but seeing as how the majority of my most recent posts have been random updates, and random updates aren’t all that interesting, I’ve decided to go with one of my very favorite themes: organization.

There’s a grand irony to be found in my obsession with organization, out in full force every January with the coming of the “clear the clutter! solutions for small spaces! get organized at last!” magazine covers. Although I am organized as far as knowing where things are, at work, paying my bills on time, and so on, I am also sort of a huge mess, basically all of the time. When I travel, my suitcase has exploded within one day of arrival. My house has no shortage of piles. All of the time. And I have way, way too much stuff.

All of this organizational stuff is completely aspirational for me. I get that. It’s one small part of my love for IKEA and the Container Store. I fantasize that, someday, when I’m more settled and life is less hectic and I can actually build in storage, I will be less of a train wreck. Every January, it seems less and less likely.

And there’s something so silly about the fact that this push to organize and clear out comes right after Christmas, the root of so much stuff. And I love stuff, don’t get me wrong. I know I’ve written about this phenomenon before. I’m totally giddy with my new presents. I’m excited to have enough wine glasses to have friends over. I am wearing new earrings here as I type, new wool wrist warmers were perfect for my walk to work this morning, hot coffee in hand.

And that doesn’t even count the (many) things I buy for myself.

If all goes as planned, 2012 will be a year of great change. Everything is still uncertain; I’m feeling both excited and really, really freaked out. But, just as I’ll never be a minimalist, I also don’t want my stuff weighing me down. This is the year of use it or lose it. All of that stationery I’ve been saving forever? Trying to actually use it as part of my 52 Weeks of Mail challenge. The “fancy” paper napkins? Seems like a good excuse to have people over, or a way to spice up a solo brunch. I’ve been burning candles like nobody’s business, almost every night. The time to do it all is now.

So I’m going through some clothes and clearing out some of the clutter, as the magazine gods tell me to do. I’m scrolling through my Organization board on Pinterest more often than normal as the new year approaches. And I’m trying to jump on the new year, new (organized) world bandwagon one more time.

Wish me luck!

(ok, fess up: do you derive strange pleasure from images of organized spaces, even as you sit among total clutter? any tips that were promised to be life-altering actually have an effect on your everyday life?)

(ALSO, I would like to take this moment to remind everyone that paper goods are spelled STATIONERY. It’s not an unmoving, stationary anything, y’all. I see this typo all of the time and it drives me batty. And now the WordPress built-in spell check tells me stationery is not a word. False! 2012 resolution, paper people: spell stationery correctly. That is all.)