Shopping for Martha

       While in New York, I did not ignore my clutter crisis entirely. While I did spend vast amounts of time clothes shopping, a tiny portion of that was spent looking for just the right equipment to ready my home for Martha's guidance.

       As Martha points out, dealing with incoming mail is a huge maintenance challenge. Indeed, opening and sorting the mail is one of the six items she lists as a required daily activity.

       As CEO of the household, I do open the mail. And I spent some time considering what to do with it -- pay this bill, look at that catalogue for gift ideas, consider getting tickets to this event, maybe use that coupon, etc. But then, generally, I later pile up all the bills, catalogues, event notices and coupons together into a small pile that I add to the various cluttered places in our home.

       Luckily, I have an excellent memory, and do remember pretty much everything I have seen -- when bills are due, etc. But the problem is, for example, remembering what pile contains a specific bill when the time comes to pay it. And where is one of those pesky discount cards from Bed Bath and Beyond, when I need it? All the opened mail tends to look pretty much the same, especially when piled together.  Accordingly, I often waste vast amounts of time looking through the small piles for whatever it is that I suddenly, desperately, want or need.

       Sorting the mail the Martha way is designed to address this problem. She suggests dividing the mail into one of four in-boxes for: personal correspondence, bills, catalogues and filing.

       So, naturally, I had to go shopping for the perfect set of four in-boxes. The Container Store, just down the street from Bloomingdales, seemed the perfect place to look, especially since Bloomingdales closed early (who knew?).

       While there, I decided against a stack of four letter trays, because experience pretty much guarantees that I will end up using them to create a multi-level paper pile that I'll still have to sift through. Instead, I chose a six-slot file holder. That way, I can slip all four mail categories into their proper slots, and be able to flip through them easily -- without anything being hidden or covered up.  And the two extra slots will allow me to tailor the mail-sorting to my own needs. For example, the fifth slot might be a good place to put information about upcoming events and ticket purchases. I can use the sixth slot for coupons. And frankly, how much personal correspondence to I get through regular mail? I'll use that slot instead for the take-out menus I'm going to start saving. 

       So now I have a plan, and I'm almost ready to put it into action.

       Unfortunately, the file holder was way too big to fit into my luggage, especially with all the clothing and shoes I bought.  And I certainly didn't want to pay an excess baggage fee. So I left the file holder in the store.

       But it is a start, isn't it?