The Junk Drawer

Every kitchen has one, doesn't it? The junk drawer. You know what I mean. It's where all those odds and ends end up, where you toss the twist ties and tabs from bread bags, the pizza delivery menu, the rubber bands from the newspaper. Perhaps there are actual useful items there, like a pair of scissors, a bottle opener, pens and pencils. More likely, mere junk has accumulated there--the detritus of modern living.

I had a junk drawer. Now, it's an organized oasis. I need to ask, though, why it took me ten years to figure out that I could put a simple plastic organizer in that drawer and reclaim it? Here it is, in all its glory, complete with $3.00 IKEA tray.

I wish I had a before picture. I can tell you what I used to do though. When it would get so full that one had to shuffle the drawer in and out to close it, I would "clean it out". That consisted of essentially dumping all the contents into a paper sack, fishing out the few things I knew I needed (scissors, pens & pencils, baking scale, pizza delivery menus) and tossing the bag onto what we call our side porch, but what acts as a walk-in pantry. And then the bag would sit and sit, growing stale. Once it became stale enough, usually after a few months, I could more easily dump most of it into the garbage. I still would save a few things...why, I don't really know. Habit mostly.

In any case, with the new system, that won't be necessary. There are enough places in the drawer for the things that are needed, and no space for random junk.