today is the first day of the rest of my decluttered life

this is total revolution.  

if you want to join, add your john hancock to the bottom of this post.

 

IN CONGRESS, February 1, 2010

The unanimous Declaration of the three united Aldridges 

when, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for a family to dissolve the emotional bonds which have connected it with clutter, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and superior station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle it, a decent respect to the opinions of the internets requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. 

we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all family members are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of a clutter-free home. that to secure these rights, household management systems are instituted by the family, deriving their just powers from the consent of the family. that whenever any form of household management system becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the family to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new household management systems, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. prudence, indeed, will dictate that household management systems long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that families are more disposed to suffer, while clutter is sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the clutter to which they are accustomed. but when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce the family under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such household management system, and to provide new guards for their future security. --such has been the patient sufferance of this family; and such is now the necessity which constrains us to alter our former systems of household management. the history of the present clutter is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over this family.  to prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.

***

the clutter has refused its assent to organization, the most wholesome and necessary for the family good. 

it has obstructed its owners from designing systems of immediate and pressing organization, unless suspended in family operation till its assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, it has utterly neglected to be organized by them. 

it has refused to allow other means for the accommodation of large household items, unless those items would relinquish the right of representation in the household, a right inestimable to the needed items and formidable to clutter only. 

it has called together large piles of clutter at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of rubbish, for the sole purpose of fatiguing the family into compliance with its storage.

it has dissolved neat and orderly houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness its invasions on the rights of the family.

it has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be clutter-free;  whereby the clutter, incapable of annihilation, has returned to the family at large for its exercise; the home remaining in the meantime exposed to all the dangers of invasion of clutter from without, and of convulsions within. 

it has endeavored to prevent the interior decoration of the home; for that purpose obstructing the rules for naturalization of objects d'art; refusing to invite others to encourage their migration hither, and raising the conditions of new appropriations of shelf space.

it has obstructed the administration of order, by refusing its assent to rules for establishing judicious organizational powers. 

it has made the family dependent on its will alone, for the tenure of our jobs, and the amount and payment of our salaries. 

it has erected a multitude of new piles, and brought hither swarms of clutter to harass our family, and eat out of our budget. 

it has kept among us, in times of peace, standing piles of clutter without our consent.

it has affected to render the clutter independent of and superior to family happiness.

it has combined with other clutter to subject us to a jurisdiction unwelcome to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our rules;  giving its assent to their acts of pretended organization.

for quartering large bodies of clutter among us: 

for protecting the clutter, by mock organization, from punishment for any misplaced objects which they should commit on the inhabitants of this home:

for cutting off our comfort with all parts of the home: 

for imposing expenses on us without our consent: 

for depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of unoccupied surfaces: 

for transporting us beyond our driveway to shop for unneeded items: 

for abolishing the free system of organizational rules in a neighboring shed, establishing therein an arbitrary system of management, and enlarging its boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule in the shed:

for taking away our senses, abolishing our most valuable priorities, and altering fundamentally the forms of our household management: 

for suspending our own reason, and declaring itself invested with power to dictate for us in all cases whatsoever. 

it has abdicated organization here, by declaring us out of its protection and waging war against us. 

it has plundered our resources, ravaged our psyches, buried our horizontal surfaces, and destroyed the orderliness of our family.

it is at this time transporting large armies of foreign clutter to complete the works of desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most prosperous ages, and totally unworthy the head of a civilized household:

it has constrained our family members taken captive among the piles to bear arms against each other, to become the executioners of their personal collections, or to fall themselves by their hands. 

it has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavored to bring on the inhabitants of our home, the merciless piles and boxes, whose known rule of warfare, is undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions. 

***

In every stage of these oppressions we have attempted reform in the most humble terms: our repeated attempts have been answered only by repeated injury. a prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free family.

nor have we been wanting in attention to our non-clutter.  we have warned it from time to time of attempts to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. we have reminded it of the circumstances of our moving to a larger home and settlement here. we have appealed to its native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured it by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. it has been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. we must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our separation, and hold it, as we hold the rest of clutter, enemies in war, in peace friends. 

we, therefore, the members of the aldridge family, in general congress, assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name, and by the authority of the good people of this family, solemnly publish and declare, that this united family is, and of right ought to be free and independent of clutter; that we are absolved from all allegiance to the clutter, and that all emotional connection between it and the aldridge family, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as free and independent people, we have full power to levy war on the clutter, conclude peace, contract storage space, establish boundaries, and to do all other acts and things which independent people may of right do. and for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred shelf space. 

rowena aldridge, minister of domestic embellishments

rudi aldridge, household enrichment officer

ella aldridge, homestead assistant and trophy child

***

NOW'S YOUR CHANCE!  JOIN THE REVOLUTION!

please add the "kick out the clutter" banner to your post and/or link back to www.romesticity.com so that folks can find other participants.  if you want to use the banner, simply copy and paste this code into your blog post:

<a href="http://www.romesticity.com/2010/02/today-is-the-first-day-of-the-rest-of-my-decluttered-life.html "><img src="http://rowena.typepad.com/kick%20out%20the%20clutter%20badge.jpg" border="0" /></a>

if you don't have a blog, just leave a comment telling us what you're planning to do!  everybody is welcome, we can all cheer each other's accomplishments!

Comments

[Sarah]

Definitely in on this one!

[mamafitz]

i am IN. :)

[rowena___.]

woohoo! it's good to have company. i already have a huge bag filled to go out the door!

[Annie]

I'm with you.

[Dawna]

In with ya too...I've already started!

[Terri]

Okay, I'm in. I'm hoping to combine it with the challenge I'm running on my blog. :) With your challenge I'll deal with the big stuff and leave the small stuff for mine.

[Amy]

I started kicking out the clutter by cutting up some old college/law school shirts to make a memory quilt!