Gatherers vs. throw-awayers

Men have been hunters and gathers since the dawn of time so it should come as no surprise that around tax time, we find we have gathered way too much stuff.

In the coming months, countless hours will be spent hunting through it all just to find those faded white receipts. Unfortunately this year there is nothing that can save you from this laborious task. And next year will be the same unless you have my system: the stack and pile system.

First, talk to all the retailers in your area about using orange paper for receipts. Just think of how easy it would be to find them in your many piles of paper around the house. Second, if your better half wants to throw out some of your piles, let him or her. The fewer piles, the less time you’ll spend looking for those faded white receipts and the more time you’ll have for important stuff – like watching football. Besides, if you’re like most people, you’re going to make the numbers up anyway. That’s why they call it estimating tax.

Around our house, I’m the gatherer; The Wife is the throw-awayer, and believe me, it’s really hard to keep up. As soon as I have a new pile, she throws it away. She went on a business trip last week, and I think I’m finally gaining ground. In her absence several new piles have magically appeared in the office, bedroom, living room and on the kitchen counter. The kitchen counter is my favorite place for new piles of stuff.

The stack and pile system is really simple. If something is important enough to save for tax reasons, just stack it on the office desk. When the desk gets full, move the stacks and pile them on the floor. Even with all those white receipts, whatever you are looking for will either be in one of the stacks on the desk or in one of the many piles on the floor. You can run out of file cabinet space, but you’ll never run out of floor piling space.

In these uncertain economic times, the stack and pile system is job security. First, if your desk at work is completely covered with stacks of paper, no one else in the office will want to deal with it. It actually looks like you’re wading through mounds of work. Second, if the boss wants to find you, you can easily hide behind the many stacks and catch a short nap.

Even The Wife has adopted my stack and pile system. We’ve been in our house for two years and still have boxes in the basement yet to be unpacked. I figure if we haven’t needed it in all that time, we probably could survive without it. It was not to be.

After spending piles of money on new shelving units and clear plastic containers, we unpacked all of our stuff — just to repack it and stack it on the shelves. It’s a start. I guess next year we’ll try to throw some of it away.

If you have kids and a SUV, then you too can utilize my organizational skills with the new stack and pile system for your car. Got a half-empty drink bottle? Just have your children add it to the pile that’s already on the floorboard. It will share the space with those dropped Cheerios, gummy bears and the half-eaten things now covered in a gray fuzz. With soccer uniforms and dirty laundry piled on top, you’re guaranteed never to see it again.

And don’t worry about what the other parents will say. In the back of their SUVs, they have stacks and piles of their own.