My kitchen counters are a 3-D diary of my daily life. Receipts, unread newsletters and articles, an empty glasses case (glasses MIA), suntan lotion, an almost used-up toothpaste tube, sticky notes, unsticky notes, magazines, scrunchies, crumbs…litter every horizontal surface in the room. I just can’t seem to adopt the “one-touch” method for mail or any other item. About once a month I make a sweep of the room and the tile countertops make a special guest appearance for a day or two. It’s quite satisfying.

Today is the day I designated for the monthly purge of clutter. In a moment of pre-Christmas insanity I decided to flaunt the pile of stuff I had gathered and hang it on the tree with clothespins, paper clips, and ornament hangers. The result is quite festive, I think. If I felt particularly Adventish I would sit down and ponder how each of the items on the tree is a symbol of my cluttered, unfocused life. But I won’t do that. Clutter may be “an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual disaster” but just for today I will celebrate the abundance each of these “ornaments” represents.