GARAGE GOALS FOR THE NEAR FUTURE

Garage goals come in two types: clean and messy.

Take a mechanics garage for example.

One is organized and tidy in a messy business; the other shows old parts stacked in corners and debris all around.

Who do you want working on your car?

I talked to the tidy guy, asking what he does when he comes across a problem he’s never seen.

He said he looks forward to those times.

Other mechanics bring problems for him to solve.

That’s when he shines.

The guy in the dirty garage is always busy, so busy that he parks cars in a queue waiting for service.

One of them is an auto diagnostician breaking down problems to the key roots for a better result; the other is a remove and replace guy with ideas on what to do with the replaced parts, like stack them in a corner.

Isn’t this the way of life?

Who doesn’t save things in case you need them later?

Me: A little piece of wire? You need a little piece of wire? I’ll be right back. (exits to garage and returns) Here you go.

 

A Professional Garage

Working mechanics in the commercial world come in all shapes and sizes.

As long as they have trust they have work in the future.

Then you find guys who take it a step further.

From polished concrete floors, immaculate storage, and classic cars, they work in an operating room.

What do you do if you can’t find a house with a dream garage?

You fine a house with enough room to build one, and once built it only gets better.

How many times to you meet people with a plan so big you walk away with a big dream too?

I dream of a garage plan, a garage cleaning plan, to restore my confidence in getting organized.

And my self esteem in some measure.

So I asked, “How do you keep things in such good order?”

Just asking the question is a confession of a problem: I’m a mess.

My storage is a mess, a messy garage, messy closet, messy dresser top, messy drawers.

Me: What’s the first step for achieving a better organized mess?

I got the only answer that qualifies as truth, and if I follow it, I’ll have an answer, the same answer.

 

The Garage Goals Answer To Life

Start with one shelf. Not a shelving unit, one shelf.

Choose what you may use or need in the near future and get rid of the rest.

Me: Sell it?

Sell, donate, recycle, throw it away. Get it out of the garage.

That’s the first shelf. Now look what’s on it and decide if that’s the right shelf for that stuff.

This sounded like 1+1=2, and it sounded new to me.

In fairness, I’ve done some organizing. I managed a museum collection for crying out loud.

So why do I feel handicapped when it comes to my stuff?

Because I see it as a whole, instead of One. Single. Shelf.

One small shelf of mixed crap for home and garden? I can look at that objectively.

The whole collection of holiday decorations, closets of coats from many eras like black leather from the 80’s and Air Force flight jacket from the 40’s, three generations of tools, is too much all at once.

Big problems broken down to small units, then reset in an improved order? Those are my garage goals, and why not.

I could leave it like some real estate yokel expecting someone to pick up after I sell the place, but that’s not the right path and I know it.

That’s what you do when you give up on life, when you quit, when you die but no one really notices because you’re still walking around.

But you notice, and you either do something, or do nothing then bitch about ‘the way things are.’

Think about that shelf when you vote in November. What kind of garage goals do you have?