How Many Closets Does One Really Need?
So if you haven’t caught on in some of my earlier blog posts or even on social media, I recently moved into a new house, well a “New To Me” house. Unlike most of the other houses I’ve lived in during my life this house is relatively young! I tend to prefer old houses, big Victorians, old 1800’s farm houses, really any house that has a lot of character. I love squeaky floors, creaking stairs, porcelain sinks with hot and cold knobs! I love built in china cabinets, wavy glass in windows, elaborately ornate staircases, fireplaces with massive mantles and oddly shaped kitchens with butler’s pantries! I’m a firm believer in the adage “they just don’t make them like they used to!” So to find myself moving into a house built in 1992 was a bit of shock to my system. I mean there were no slanting floors, drafty windows or basement stairs that led down into the dark abyss!
I didn’t shop around for this house, it more or less found me. If you know me, and my life these past couple of years, you’ll understand. If you are new, just hang on, once you realize how things work around here the fact that a house found me actually makes perfect sense. So this little house in the woods that found me is actually quite perfect despite the fact it is so “young”. Not only is it lacking in all of the unique features found in homes of the era I prefer it is also lacking in white trim. I am a white trim paint fanatic! Every bit of trim, in any house I have ever lived in, has to be white. Nothing but white. Period. End of story. And yet this little house, has no white trim. It’s actually, gasp, oak trim in every room. And oak cabinets. And oak doors, even down to the louvered oak doors on the closets. It was a hard pill to swallow at first, all of this oak. Not that I don’t find oak beautiful, I mean I tore up all of the carpeting and had oak flooring installed. It’s clearly not an oak revolt. it’s just that I’m a white trim kind of girl! That’s all.
One of the features often missing in older homes are closets, which I never really understood. I mean have you seen the size of the dresses or skirts women in the 1800’s wore? Vast amounts of fabric that had to be hung, it couldn’t have all fit folded neatly into a drawer. And yet every old house I have ever lived in would have only one closet per room that was roughly the size of a filing cabinet. One of the great mysteries in life is where they stored all of those dresses because they were not hanging them up in closets the size that we expect in our homes today. The lack of closest in older homes is something I will never understand!
So on the day I walked through this little house in the woods, I was actually glad to see ten closets! Yes there are 10 closets in my new house. Four in the master bedroom alone! And they are huge! The closets, and the amount of storage space in the house clearly testifies to the fact that it was built in 1992. The little house and I were going to get along just fine. The house and I discussed it. I would trade in my love of white trim, and promise not to paint everything white and in exchange this peaceful little house would give me ample closets!
I mentioned in my blog two weeks ago that I had really made some tough decisions on what to bring to the new house and what to dispose of as I packed up. Part of that middle age purge when you realize stuff you’ve held on to for years isn’t really that important. So when the moving truck pulled up to the little house in the woods with the oak trim I was confident that I was arriving in a less materialistic, more slimmed down life. Simpler. I had the bare essentials with me and I was very proud of that fact.
That was until I tried fitting my scaled back personal belongings into the ten closets and thirty-five cabinets and drawers in the kitchen. I know there are exactly thirty-five because I ordered new door handles and drawer pulls, because the cabinets were all oak and I actually prefer white kitchens. But I had promised this little house in the woods that I wouldn’t paint anything white so I swapped out the tarnished brassy looking handles from the 1990’s for sleek, modern black ones. Still, I struggled to find room for my things.
How is it in 2024 that one woman can dispose of nearly three quarters of her belongings, feel like she has just the bare essentials and then still not be able to fit it all into a house with ten closets? How many closets does one really need? Trust me I don’t have a Kardashian worthy wardrobe! I wear pretty much the same handful of black items over and over! I have the usual spattering of pocketbooks and shoes. I didn’t even bring all of my books! Slashed away at my nativity scene collection! Dragged boxes of serving dishes and relish trays to Goodwill. Limited myself to only four small kitchen appliances (I’m sorry I can’t live without a rice cooker!) and five of my most favorite coffee mugs! I’m really living a spartan life here, and yet I still have things sitting on the floor in my bedroom because I don’t know where to put them! It begs the question how in the world did people live with just one tiny closet per room?
I don’t feel that the little house in the woods has cheated me on our agreement that it would offer up ample storage in exchange for me not painting all of that oak white. Closet space withstanding I have actually come to love all of this oak trim. Now that I’m pretty much settled I enjoy the abundance of natural light that floods every room of this house. The massive windows that look out on the pine and spruce trees seem to invite nature right inside. I walk around the acreage and it’s so quiet I can hear the feathers rustle on the crows as they fly over head. The pond is beautiful and whole place just sighs with a breath of peace and tranquility both inside and out. The oak trim is a natural fit and I guess I’ll leave it just the way it is!