Calm in the Chaos?

I’ve got 64 minutes to write this thing.

Which will leave me enough time before lunch to transform my closet from a late winter wardrobe into an early spring one. If all goes well, I can catch the monthly stop of the Easter Seals truck at my home and donate some unneeded clothes. Hopefully, I can squeeze in some time on the elliptical – while I’m organizing my recipe files.

If you haven’t realized it already, I am a member of the Overly Organized (OO). One part compulsive, one part control freak, I live in a world that constantly plays tricks on my orderly mentality. Some of these “tricks” include: a broken vacuum, a lost anything, unexpected visitors and weeds.

A Netflix rental to me means a blissful evening of folding laundry and filing bills. The opposite of a procrastinator, I actually anticipate the arrival of field trip permission slips from my children’s teachers, and gently remind them when they’re not forthcoming. Pity the poor educator who has my child as a student.

My children’s birthday parties are followed by gruesome hours of household toy inventory analyses and restocking. And for each gift unwrapped with pieces/parts, I quickly imagine a Tupperware container in which to store them.

Even technology has proved to be my nemesis. You would think an OOer such as myself would welcome all the convenient ways to organize and contact and be contacted. Not so. Technology has taken my craft and made a mockery of the OO mentality. We OOers were doing quite well without all the beeps and bytes, thank you.

No longer is my return from the grocery store one leisurely afternoon of expiration date sorting and spice alphabetizing. No, sadly not. My mobile voice mail, home phone answering machine, and e-mail call to me like Poe's "The Raven," adding to the size of my Blackberry to-do list.

It is madness to us OOers, I tell you, madness.

By now, you are all thinking one of three things: (1) What a total nutcase! (2) There is medication for you. (3) I am lime green with envy.

Trust me, there is no room for envy. (And, believe me, I couldn’t stand the clutter.) For every happily ignored overflowing laundry hamper in your home, there is a half empty one in mine that relentlessly calls my name. You “less than OOers”, for lack of a better word, have no comprehension of this life of orderly anxiousness.

So I’m coming clean. Really, really shiny clean. I’m coming out of my California closet and acknowledging my propensity to overdose on order. And I am seeking a life that includes more chaos. Or at least the ability to recognize that life really is chaos. Whichever comes first.

Why? I have finally met my arch enemy. This has caused my automatic pilot to enter emergency mode, akin to Lance Armstrong’s front wheel suddenly flinging off his bike as he furiously pedals towards the finish line. Who or what is this powerful force of nature?

She lives somewhere in a very smelly room upstairs and is called a teenager. For those of you who have one, I need not offer an explanation. For those of you who don’t, ask somebody who does.

And I met a new friend who, after subconsciously removing lint from each other’s sweaters during one conversation, it became clear was another OOer. We recently spent an afternoon comparing new products from The Container Store catalog and offhandedly wiping smudges from my stainless steel appliances. I couldn’t wait to send her home. Am I that obnoxious?

Irreparable damage to my family’s psyche is another reason I’ve decided to mend my ways. My daughter’s teacher once told me that my little one had lamented on more than one occasion, “We just have to get this crooked line to the playground in order!” Her teacher thought it was cute. I thought it was scary.

And finally, I’m exhausted.

I’ve decided that the grand “to-do” list of daily living is self-sustaining. OOers like myself will always add two more tasks for each one we erase. Never will the list be blank. And even if it were, it doesn’t guarantee total bliss.

Life happens while we are busy organizing it, like a choreographer so intent on instructing his dancers that he fails to recognize the beauty of the art. In the spirit of the oft-quoted deathbed analogy reflecting on a life well-lived, let mine not be listed on one long magnetic pad.

So I didn’t make my bed this morning. Oh, all right, I left it wrinkly. And I’ve set my clocks behind, just so I can arrive late and flustered for something every once in awhile.

Mostly, I notice things. Who knew that there is calm in the chaos? And happy are those who find it.