Jaci Dawn

“Have you adjusted to retirement yet?”

If my husbands answers, he says something about my inability to sleep in/stay up late, but that seem to be enjoying my time “off”.

But if you were to ask me, I’d say that it’s going jolly well, although a bit slow. I’ve organized my studio.

Yes, it still looks cluttered, but it’s only 20×20′ (give or take) and I have a lot of artistic hobbies. If I can see the area rug in its entirety, I consider the room “clean” and “organized”. Each hobby has its own area. (That’s Godot, my first faerie creation,enjoying my wicker chair. Godot is several years old now.)

I have cleaned out my closet and dresser, and presently have four or five boxes of items to donate to a thrift shop, much of which is business attire. I am not a business attire sort of person. I’m a blue jeans and tee shirt sort of girl, maybe a hippie dress in the summer, and I’ve recently discovered how comfy yoga pants really are (especially for those of us with a bit of a muffin top).

Have you been watching that series on Netflix about decluttering? Well, I have not. I don’t think she can help me. Much of what we own (that clutters our lives) is vintage and antique, unusual, and definitely collectible. And there are the books, which, if you have followed me over the years, are currently in shelves approximating the Dewey Decimal system. The books are a pleasure to us. Apparently, Marie Kondo, hostess of the Netflix series, believes that one should own no more than 30 books.

No. Just – NO. The unread ones beckon, the vintage ones scintillate, the antique ones are bound in leather, and the resource ones have SO.MUCH.INFORMATION in them. What butterfly is that? What herb & what use? What mammal? What bird? What rock? There are a ton of books on our shelves that beg, “Re-read me” even though I’ve read them several times over.

OK, I do have some cheap paperback mystery/romance books to recycle at our local library’s used book store.

I have also been s-l-o-w-l-y cleaning the bathroom. I thought I’d be done by now with such a small room (6×9′ give or take a foot) but it hasn’t worked out that way. I damaged my right rotator cuff and I have to do the work with my left hand/arm. I’m ambidextrous, so that isn’t a problem, but I do tend to use the right arm more out of habit and the sheer strength of the arm. I’m scrubbing te lodged in dirt out of the baseboards, scrubbing the stained white linoleum, and scouring the porcelain. The shower stall has been the worst: soap scum & mildew. I an claim I am finished with that corner now, but the truth of the matter is this: nothing gets rid of the mildew. Today, I bleached. No go. We’ll have to pull the caulking out and clean, then re-caulk with mildew resistant caulking.  There’s no getting around it.

However, I have scrubbed the soap scum off the glass doors and you can see through them clearly now. It’s amazing! I’m trying to do this without using chemicals, but sometimes I have had to capitulate. It is slow going, but I am loving the results. I’d rather have tile in that room and a little more color than white. I have managed to not hurt my shoulder anymore, and that’s huge. I’m not sure how it will work when I try to clean underneath the full-sized cast iron claw foot bathtub..

Meanwhile, I am also working on some of those myriad hobbies, but that’s for later.

My answer to the question? I only retired from the 9-5 routine. I have so much more work to do, and time to do it now! I love it!