The Picture of Organized

My Grandma passed away last Monday at the age of 90. Before that day, I thought I knew all there was to know about being organized. I have read every book on the subject of organization and I have bookmarked every web site and forum related to the subject. At the funeral last Friday, my two cousins and my aunt stepped up to say a few words about Grandma. I heard all the expected things…she was kind, never raised her voice, opened her home to everyone, etc. Every word of it was true. Yet each one of my relatives said something that I had never even associated with my grandma before. They said she was “organized”. I have to admit that it threw me for a loop. I mean, I grew up seeing my grandma practically every single day. My cousins always lived far away and only visited a few times each year. How could they say Grandma was “organized”? This morning, it hit me.

When I think of an “organized” person, I think of a squeaky clean kitchen with immaculate shelves of foods grouped by type with a spice rack that is alphabetized and a kitchen counter with the bare essentials on top. I see a black leather day planner with page after page of appointments, todo lists sorted and arranged for optimum efficiency, a file cabinet with pristine color-coded folders and an office desk with just a phone, a calendar and an inbox on top. I imagine closets full of neatly labeled plastic containers, an easily accessible tool box and drawers systematically arranged to dispense what you need when you need it.

Grandma’s house wasn’t like that at all. Her kitchen was squeaky clean, but her counters always had some baked goods on top and dirty dishes in the sink. My favorite kitchen drawer was usually stuffed with bags of marshmallows, circus peanuts or orange slice gummy candies with Grandpa’s obsessive rubber band collection crammed into a cool whip container in the front. On the other side of the kitchen a half-finished project would be sitting on top of the desk, which was made up mostly of junk drawers containing key chains, nail files, paper clips and other riff-raff promotional trinkets from my grandpa’s job. One of these drawers also housed a few pets like a plastic snake, fake flies and a rubber mouse that my grandpa used to play pranks on us. As for Grandma’s closets, all I remember is that our toys were tossed together in a big cardboard box with the word “toys” scrawled across it (which I was finally able to read once I learned cursive writing in the third grade).

So how did my grandma earn the reputation of being so organized? Even the preacher at her funeral (her nephew) said she was “one very organized lady”. Something about those words stuck with me and I replayed the funeral tapes in my head over and over for the last several days trying to figure out what was meant by “organized”. I kept comparing my version of “organized” with my memories of Grandma and it just didn’t make any sense to me. Then I began to recall all of the other things that were said about Grandma and slowly it started to come together.

Grandma was never in a hurry. I can’t ever remember being rushed out the door or told to “hurry up”. Not once. There was never any sense of urgency when I was with Grandma. She never drove fast. She didn’t have an overbooked calendar or even a schedule. She just did what she needed to do and let the rest go. The event was never that important. It was the time spent with the people she loved that counted.

Grandma’s projects were never more important than me. We always lived within walking distance of Grandma’s house and I can’t even count how many times I burst into her house unannounced. She always got up from whatever she was doing and gave me a hug and offered me a snack. Even after I had raided the candy drawer and spilled rubber bands all over the floor, she would still get me piece of pie or cookies or whatever was sitting on her counter top. It didn’t matter who came over or at what time of day it was, there was always something homemade to eat and Grandma had time to sit down and talk. There were always people visiting at Grandma’s house.

Grandma didn’t care about the mess. We had toys to play with at Grandma’s house and my grandpa was forever going to auctions and buying us new stuff. Grandma never complained. She just scooped it all up off the floor into that big cardboard box when we were done. Every once in a while we would sort the parts and pieces, but no one really cared if the farm animals got mixed in with the Legos. No need to fuss over things that didn’t matter.

Grandma liked the simple life. Her closets weren’t overstuffed. I can’t ever remember ever going shopping with Grandma anywhere other than to the grocery store. Stuff didn’t matter to her. Holidays were impossible because she never gave us a list or any ideas. She didn’t want anything. The less stuff she owned, the less stuff she had to manage. She would rather sit in the yard swing and visit with neighbors than try to program a VCR or learn how to use a computer.

So now when someone tells me my Grandma was “organized”, I realize that what they really mean is that Grandma always had time for them. She didn’t manage time or manage things. Grandma spent time with people and that’s what they remember. Her organizing skills amounted to being able to put all the other stuff aside to spend time with people. There was no rigid schedule to follow and no project so important that she couldn’t stop for a few minutes and connect with the people she loved. That is what it means to be organized – to be able to discern your priorities from moment to moment. They don’t teach that in the books I read.

Thanks for the lesson, Grandma. I miss you.