Storage for Supplies & Life Rambling

As haunters, we often talk about storage for our finished props but we rarely talk about storage of our supplies. My vanishing act the last little while can be contributed mainly to trying to figure out how and where to store my inventory of goods.

I never had a considerable surplus of art supplies before this year. Sure, there were a few salvaged items left over from the Halloween decorating rush, waiting another year to be recycled into next Halloween's theme. That's different. Now that I make a number of smaller items throughout the year, each of them needing different craft supplies, it's a whole new game.

I don't have the luxury of a workshop. We live in a bungalow with no garage. Yetch's home office is in the basement, and we only use one room down there for miscellaneous storage. It's filled to the brim with Christmas and Halloween decorations, bicycles and boxes.

The second bedroom on the main floor is the small space I use for my home office (doubling as the main floor tv/flake out room). That means I have to get creative with storing my supplies and any completed works. Emphasis on creative since there is no cash flow for new furniture that could help me out.

By December of this past year, the entire main floor - living room, dining room, office, and bedroom - looked like a crafter disaster zone. It was embarrassing, never mind frustrating and overwhelming. But I truly had no idea where to put things. And there was so much of it that needed a home. I can't live - never mind create - in complete chaos for too long. And really, this place has been a building pit of paperclays and paint since June.

I realize it might not seem like a big deal (we all go through periods where the house is a tornado zone), but I'm a master organizer. Be it paperwork, spice collection, suitcase, storage space, whatever; if it can be arranged for maximum usage, I'm all over it. Yet I was stumped; completely unable to produce an effective, long term solution. Heck, my short term solutions were weak at best.

A serious reorganizing of the house was in order. I needed space to organize new items, and to do that I had to reorganize all the old items stuffed into the nooks and crannies of the main floor. This takes time. Luckily, time is the one thing I have a lot of at the moment.

I won't bore you with details of the back-breaking labour involved with moving furniture, lugging boxes, and sorting through the accumulation that is your life up until this point. This brings me to my mini-revelation.

This surplus of new stuff - art supplies, Brains Vs Coffee books, envelopes, packaging supplies, small boxes, completed pieces, table display items for shows - all represents my official shift into a new life: the path I've been taking this last year as an artist has materialized in every aspect (and every room in my house). And I've been struggling to make it fit in with my old life, physically and metaphorically.

Just as I don't know where to store my surplus of Christmas themed craft supplies, or where to hide the 200 shipping envelopes I bought in bulk, I don't know how this new venture fits into my life. How much room do I make for it? And what precedence does it take over other things already established?

In order to make physical space for this new life that's taken over, I have to get rid of items that represented what had been my focus up until this point. Storage decisions and compromises that made perfect sense 8 months ago no longer work.

It's a surprisingly surreal experience. Normally I'm good at purging items to make room for new ones, but every time I pack up something of meaning that I kept at the ready in an easily accessible drawer - doomed to dwell in storage baskets on the top shelves of closets - I'm reminded of how real this path as an artist has become, and how quickly it's evolved once I set it all in motion.

Truth is, I've had one heel on the ground as I pedal along, dragging in the dirt to keep me at a steady pace while I tried out this new venture (don't stop the momentum, but keep an even speed while you get used to it and learn how it all works). This strategy has served me well and kept the anxiety at a level where it was evened out by excitement.

The last few months picked up speed, moving faster than I could comfortably make sense of it, or room for it. In my mind, I was still testing it out. But as I shuffle the old for the new, it becomes more and more clear that I've subconsciously made choices to move forward without being aware of it. My brain needs to catch up to my physical reality (or is it the other way around?). Clearly, by the mass amount of homeless art-specific items, I've decided to move forward and commit to this path, even if I didn't know it emotionally. And I have no real idea where it's headed or what I want to do next.

Making room - properly - for all of this stuff, has been therapeutic. Almost cathartic. I'm using this time to not only figure out where the items should go, but where my path as an artist is headed. Both are a challenge. And baffling. And at times, a complete mystery.

I haven't come up with perfect solutions yet either. Items are stored in my office (under the cabinet of the tv; in drawers; behind decorative pillows on shelves), in the bedroom (in the main closet; my night stand; and the small cube table in the corner), in the living room (our coffee table has a swivel top with storage beneath), and in a dresser in the basement. All spots have different purposes, and all spots indicate different uses and priorities.

No, it's not a perfect solution, but it fits. It doesn't overwhelm day-to-day living (or me), but instead is there just beneath the surface. Kind of like my drive as an artist.

More importantly, this system works well enough that I'll be able to start planning ahead once more. Calmly. Clearly.

And as my path changes, I suppose, so will my storage choices.