Jamie's Musings

Late-Night Revelation

If life were like a spreadsheet, with pre-established but easily scalable (and formattable) cells, I would always be neat and organized. Everything would fit into a discrete cell; there would be no choice but to choose, as there is no in-between. Cells would live within sheets, and sheets would relate to create space.

Instead I have choice, the outcome of which is most frequently influenced by deprioritization, distraction and laziness. Life breeds ambiguity and hinges upon the in-between spaces. I have messy rooms and messy desks, perpetually. No matter how many shelves or drawers are available to me, there’s always the option to leave stuff hanging over an edge or piled on top of something else. And I usually do.

Maybe I just care less about my things than I do about data. Organization of data provides apparent, straightforward value; things just aren’t worth the effort to organize so meticulously. I can get away with strewing items haphazardly because I’m pretty good at remembering where I left things—there’s no value in me taking extra time to organize, other than to make my space presentable in the eyes of others. 

Thus, I am a slob and have come to embrace that facet of my identity :)

Other than to cater to others, the mess only needs reigned in when it interferes with my activities. Every so often there is either a breaking point where the cognitive load becomes too much, or some outside force throws off the flow of organized chaos and disrupts my memory. These times require a reset.

My room is close enough to reset to get me through my third-to-last academic term at Drexel that started today. Hopefully.

Goodnight :)

EDIT: I lied, brain wouldn’t let me sleep until I added this point… All of that ties into one of the things I love most about being a UXer—we work inside the lines as well as in between them.