Attorney David Wheeler shrugs off his wife’s claims that he is messy.
This despite occasionally leaving candy wrappers around his West Town home and frequently “jump-shooting” folded clothes onto an 8-foot-high shelf, according to his wife. “I’m 6 feet,” Wheeler, 44, said, sheepishly. “So they don’t always land still folded.”
Then there are the crumb-covered plates he leaves on the family’s computer desk. But rather than labeling himself a slob, Wheeler calls himself a “realist.”
His wife of three years, attorney Lauren Blair, suggested a different term: “denialist.”
“I made the word up,” Blair, 37, said at a recent interview over lunch, during which the couple engaged in a classic verbal clash of the organized versus the disorganized.
“I can’t believe he doesn’t see the clutter he leaves around the house,” Blair said. “David even had the nerve to ask me, when we were setting up this interview, ‘Which one of us is the messy one?’ “
Wheeler countered his wife’s claims by saying he is too busy chasing their 2-year-old son or pursuing his hobbies to “organize pencils by length” or “sort clothes by color.”
“People who spend a lot of time cleaning and organizing should re-examine their priorities,” Wheeler said.
Sorry neat freaks, but Wheeler isn’t alone in his thinking. There is a growing pro-messiness movement, said David Freedman, co-author of “A Perfect Mess: The Hidden Benefits of Disorder–How Crammed Closets, Cluttered Offices, and On-the-Fly Planning Make the World a Better Place,” which was published in January.
Even Freedman has been surprised by the amount of support he has received from closet clutterers. After years of being brainwashed to believe that messiness is wrong, he said, Americans are starting to strike back.
“You turn on Oprah or the ‘Today’ show and you see a fireman who rescued 10 people’s lives, followed by a professional organizer who has saved the lives of messy people,” Freedman said. “That’s crazy. There is an entire industry built on organizing.”
That organizing industry is booming and seeing no sign of a backlash, said Barry Izsak, the president of the National Association of Professional Organizers. Izsak said membership in the organization, which was founded in 1985, jumped from 2,000 to 4,000 within the last four years.
Said Freedman: “I don’t want to mess with anyone’s livelihood. But we shouldn’t perpetuate the idea that being messy is something people should feel guilty about. Do you think Albert Einstein maintained a neat office? Look at what he has been able to accomplish.”
Lakeview resident John O’Loughlin, 46, also believes there is a tendency toward overorganization in society, especially at work, where a clean desk is considered the sign of an efficient employee.
O’Loughlin, a financial accounting consultant, said he once worked for a technology company that issued citations for messy desks. Though he described himself as neat and has hired local organizing company Gainer Organizing for his business and home office, O’Loughlin said his level of organization is not for everyone, nor should it be.
“I let people work within their style, and everything doesn’t need to be kept perfectly neat,” O’Loughlin said. “I’d only step in with an employee if it got to a point where the disorganization was leaving a bad impression on customers or affecting their ability to get things done on time.”
Freedman said more people should reject the uniformity of neatness at work and at home.
“These professional organizers are always talking about getting rid of old magazines that lay about the house,” Freedman said. “I was going through my grandparents’ stuff recently and found Life magazines from the 1940s. I thought it was great to see them. Why should we throw them out? People are tired of this kind of advice.”
Local professional organizer Maureen Gainer Reilly said converting people into neat freaks is not the industry’s goal, though some might get the wrong idea from TV shows and magazines preaching pristine homes and perfect offices.
“The organizing system you use is based on the person,” said Reilly, who founded Gainer Organizing, or GO, four years ago. “Even my house isn’t perfect. Being organized just means that perhaps your system looks like clutter to someone else, but it’s fine if you can find everything you need when you need it. It saves you time and stress.”
Freedman said it’s being messy that saves you time.
“Right off the bat, someone a bit on the messy side saves a lot of time compared to someone who is really neat,” Freedman said. “Really neat people can spend hours straightening up, close to four hours in some instances every day.”
Ridiculous, Reilly said.
“Organizing is not like cleaning a house, where you clean up one week and then the next week start over from scratch,” Reilly said. “Once everything has a place, it’s easy to keep putting things away. We’re talking five to 10 minutes total of putting things back into place.”
That’s five to 10 minutes too much for Wheeler, the attorney, who said he is not planning to set up any “systems” for his stuff. If that means looking for his wallet and keys a little longer, so be it, he said.
“I’d rather spend my energy creating or solving problems,” Wheeler said. “I don’t associate being messy with being a slacker, and I have too many things to do each day to spend time organizing my stuff.”
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kkyles@tribune.com
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MESS APPEAL VS. CLEAN LIVING
The battle of the organized vs. the messy isn’t just waged in reality. RedEye rounded up some of the neatest and nastiest characters in pop culture. — Kyra Kyles
SLOBS
Cristina Yang (Sandra Oh), “Grey’s Anatomy”
The fictional Seattle Grace hospital may appear pristine, but one of its surgical interns is an unapologetic clutter-freak. Yang now lives in the immaculate trappings of fiance Dr. Preston Burke, but her original apartment looked as if it had been hit by 100-mph winds and then an avalanche of takeout boxes.
Doug Heffernan (Kevin James), “King of Queens”
Doug may be the king of Queens, but his crown should be made of crumbs. One of this slob’s sinking points was eating in bed, using his own shirt as the plate.
Randy Hickey (Ethan Suplee), “My Name is Earl”
Randy is the endearingly dim-witted brother of Earl on the NBC comedy. But he is also a sweaty, sloppy mess who manages to trash the motel room where he and Earl live. Slob that he is, it’s not surprising that Randy’s in love with a housekeeper. But would dating him be an occupational hazard for her?
Barney Gumble, “The Simpsons”
Recognizable by his powerful belch and warbling voice, Barney is the resident slob of Springfield. With unkempt hair and a filthy apartment–which he inhabits when not flirting with alcoholism at Moe’s Tavern–he makes Homer look like an upstanding citizen by comparison.
NEAT FREAKS
Dr. Preston Burke (Isaiah Washington), “Grey’s Anatomy”
From the look of his apartment, Burke is as precise and deliberate in his housecleaning as he is with a scalpel. Pity that he let now-fiance Cristina Yang move in. That HGTV-level decor isn’t long for this world.
Monica Geller (Courteney Cox), “Friends”
This lovable neat freak jumped at the chance to help her friends pack boxes, organized towels into detailed categories and kept her kitchen unrealistically spotless, even by sitcom standards. With her need to control everything in her environment, including the precise placement of furniture, it’s a wonder former roommate Rachel never bound and gagged Monica and forced her to watch some dust pile up.
Bree Van De Kamp (Marcia Cross), “Desperate Housewives”
The elegant Bree keeps her home spotless and beautiful. Too bad she can’t do the same for her family life. While she may not earn the award for Mother of the Year, she should earn Martha Stewart’s stamp of approval.
Charlotte York (Kristin Davis), “Sex and the City”
Before Bree breezed onto the TV scene, the reigning Queen of Clean was “Sex and the City” character Charlotte. The beautifully decorated apartment she inherited from a brief, rocky marriage to Dr. Trey McDougal even ended up in the pages of “House and Garden” magazine.
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YOUR BEST MESS GUESS
We snapped photos of the desks–both messy and clean–of several RedEye staffers. Can you match the desk with the person? Answers are on the next page. Don’t peek!
A. Virgil Dickson
B. Leo Ebersole
C. StickFigure
D. Jimmy Greenfield
E. Kyra Kyles
Answers
1. C (StickFigure)
2. A (Virgil Dickson)
3. B (Leo Ebersole)
4. E (Kyra Kyles)
5. D (Jimmy Greenfield)
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CLUTTER CAM
Are you a slob or a neatnik? Do you live with someone who files everything in pretty little boxes? Do you sit next to a co-worker who has papers piled 6 feet high? Take a photo of a messy or a neat place and upload it to the Chicago slobs vs. Chicago neatniks gallery at redeyechicago.com/pics.
And send your comments to ritaredeye@tribune.com.
