GIVING THE BOOT TO CLUTTER

A Swift Kick

When your own absentmindedness ungently reminds you your Stuff could use a good sorting

Photo by Apostolos Vamvouras on Unsplash

Once, in the eye of a tornadic move,
I donated a suitcase to Salvation Army.
Forty or so days later,
while admiring my beautifully barren closet,
I realized my lush collection of boots was missing.

It took me another forty or so days
of increasingly frenetic stalking and seeking —
emptying every shelf, cupboard, nook, and cranny –
for enlightenment to strike, electrocuting me
with dismay, remorse, second-guessing, and self-disdain.

The

………boots

had

……..………to have been

in my bag!*

Three years in, I’ve replaced the boots, albeit
with far fewer.
And it’s not because a display
in a bow window
of booties I love so much better
blinded me
along a village byway
that I now see
the loss as a divine act
of goodwill, if not outright salvation.