Junk is something you throw away the day before you need it

If you do not get rid of things (whether by pitching, donating, or recycling them), you are missing out on one of the greatest joys in life, I think.

On Saturday, I spent the afternoon sorting through various bookcases, closets, and cupboards and throwing things away with reckless abandon. Hundreds of sheets of paper from the semester found their final resting place in the recycle bin. Books that needed to be returned to friends went home. Decorative shelves were cleared and rearranged.

I know some people are reluctant to throw things out, agonizing that someday, somehow they’ll need the precise thing they’ve just tossed in the garbage, but I refuse to live my life in fear that someday I will desperately wish I’d kept the leaky jar of foul-smelling body lotion that someone bought me at the dollar store. I cannot live that way.

Yesterday, I spent an embarrassing amount of time sitting on my couch, gazing at my lovely and clean living room and kitchen. Several people stopped by unannounced and, ta-da, the house looked lovely (I was asleep on the couch with pillow marks on my face, but such things can be overlooked in the glow of a Christmas tree and a dusted and organized bookshelf).

So please, throw something away today – something you’ve been hanging on to simply because there was room for it, even though you will never ever ever ever ever use it. Do it for me.