My affinity for cluttered spaces never ceases to amaze me. I’m very similar to a small animal filling its den; I squirrel everything away just in case I need it later. Things in my world are in no specific order, but I can tell you where just about anything is located. The sharpie marker I especially like is in the junk drawer underneath the empty Steely Dan cd case. The prime example of this is my car. It tells a story ... a jumbled, crowded, nonsense sort of story. I do hoe it out on occasion, usually when my husband or friends have ridiculed my vast collection of useless bits and pieces, or when I have to utilize my third row seat for actual seating of people. The third row seat is the primary residence of my junkyard. The good news is that, should I be allowed to drive my car onto the set of the prolific game show, “Let’s Make A Deal,” I’d be the hands-down winner. For those unfamiliar (come out from under the rock), the show rewards the audience members that have strange and useless objects with them, whether in their pockets or purse or on their person. Oh, trust me, I’m their gal. A pink paperclip? A receipt for snocones? A lime green post-it note? Check, check, and check.

For this very article I have rummaged through my car contents to make my point. In a reach and grab sort of fashion I came up with the following items: Louisville slugger baseball bat; two first aid kits; half-frozen blackened banana; shuttlecock for badminton; four random scrabble letter tiles; bag of skittles (taste the rainbow); various sweatshirts, hats, mittens, gloves, towels and socks; blanket; approximately 89 french fries; many shoes of varying sizes, some with matches; large soup pot; box of stale Triscuits; four books and three magazines; eight granola bars; an estimated two dollars worth of returnable cans and bottles; rope; cardboard pint containers; many, many straws; dog leash; spoon; tennis ball; hand lotion; fishing lures; empty egg carton.

This was all acquired without looking under seats or within closed compartments. One can only wonder what’s lurking in those areas. My pocketbook is a more compact version of my car and also holds untellable amounts of treasure. It seems to be a catchall for my husband and children when we are outside of the home, so the contents are even more random. I’ve looked through it and discovered the following: a three inch strip of two inch construction grade staples; wine opener; pocket knife; nuts, bolts, screws and drill bits; medical tape; finger splint; hair ties; rocks; gum — wrapped and unwrapped, used and unused; many random keys; even more random receipts; fourteen pens and markers; seven cough drops in varying stages of gooeyness. You can track my every move by its contents, as well. I was at the school choral concert, Fastrac, Kinney Drugs, the post office and Walmart. I also had a little McDonalds at some point last week and still have some napkins to prove it. The barbecue sauce left over from this trip is in the pocket of my left passenger car door, should I need it in the future.

I have an image of being squished by a bus and people digging around in my purse to try to find my identification. It would certainly play like a comedy of sorts, with everything but the kitchen sink being pulled from the depths of my purse. While rummaging, those good Samaritans could all have a snack, some mints to follow, and enjoy a game of cards. They would have a vast, though confused, knowledge of me by the time they found any real identifying information. Indeed, if there were a clutter contest I could just pull right up in the car, pocketbook in tow and wait for the phrase, “Johnny, tell her what she’s won.”