Change Your Drawers, Change Your Life

When we decided to run away and become lake lizards, one of the most important parts of the process was purging ourselves of belonging that weren’t conducive to our new, downsized lifestyle. I got rid of over thirty pairs of heels, two garbage bags full of Halloween costumes, bins of books, and a whole box of kitchen gadgets (though to be fair, I didn’t know the uses for most of them). I managed to convince Frank to give up his beloved Christmas Story leg lamp, an assortment of bongs, dozens of VHS tapes (of brilliant films like Ernest Goes to Jail), and a bunch of extra bike parts from his BMX days. But, the one thing I couldn’t force him to pare down was his tee shirt collection. For the last thirty years, he’s been gathering shirts from concerts, skate parks, dive bars, and thrift stores. He’d rather part with a testicle than his tees. And, I like both his balls, so I opted to find a way to make them fit into our life and into our captain’s bed.

I know what you’re thinking. Why is this outspoken feminist folding and putting away her husband’s laundry in the first place? Because left to his own devices, Frank will stuff the drawers so full that the bottoms pop out, and we have to replace the damn things. And, I'm a control freak  I just sleep better knowing that there is order, not chaos happening underneath me as I slumber.  Now back to this life-changing solution to the great T-shirt quandary. It’s all in the folding…or lack thereof. The traditional way to store shirts is to fold them flat and place them one on top of the other in the drawer. When stacked this way, you can only see the ones on top and when you pull one from the bottom it wreaks havoc on the whole pile. BUT…if you do more of a roll on them by folding them into fourths instead of just in half, and then place them side by side, you can see all the shirts at once. Also, you can remove the desired tee without disturbing any of the others.

​Female friends (and fashion-forward men), this method also works with leggings. So, f*ck folding. I am here to extol the roll. Hallelujah.