Mark your calendars, folks.  As of the first week in July, it’s official.  All my Christmas decorations have been put away.  They are now safely stored until ‘tis the season to bring them out again.

Now, please don’t go jumping to any conclusions here.  I’m not some kind of holiday fanatic.  It’s not like ALL my decorations still dangled from doorknobs or remained ensconced on the end table.  In fact, the great majority of them got picked up and packed away during the official undecorating month of January.  But, there were a stubborn few (about five, I think) that, for some reason, I couldn’t manage to put away until the temperature hit 90.  So, from Christmas until the Fourth of July, these certain ornaments occupied a prominent spot, right on top of my filing cabinet.

And, don’t go thinking that these decorations just sat there, either.  Oh, no.  They proved to be very useful.  For instance, the one on top of the tissue box kept the tissues from getting dusty.  The dust collected on the ornament instead of on the tissues.  I hadn’t really planned it that way, but when serendipity strikes, well, you know.  Who am I to mess with that?  This same ornament also worked with the tissue box to hold up the Publisher’s Clearing House certificate, which had written on it the actual winning number that guaranteed me $1,000,000 should that number actually be drawn and announced on national TV.  I needed to have that number handy in case the prize patrol came knocking at my door.

But, the Publisher’s Clearing House deadline came and went.  The prize patrol never came (must’ve gotten lost, I guess).  The certificate with the winning number got thrown away.  Which left my ornaments with nothing to do but collect dust.  If they’re not multi-tasking, they might as well be put away.

Now that the mission was clear, I needed a plan of action.  And, as you well know, these things take time.  Day after day, week after week, I pondered the ornaments sitting on my filing cabinet, collecting dust.  How would I go about putting them away?  What would the process be?  What would be the appropriate time to act?  The decision-making process started to weigh me down.

So, one day in early July, I just did it.  I pushed open the sliding door to the closet.  I reached up and grabbed the box from the top shelf.  I set the box on the floor and removed the masking tape.  I gathered to ornaments from the filing cabinet.  I looked in the box to make sure there would be room for them.  I paused to consider whether any of the ornaments should be wrapped with tissue paper.  Having decided yes, I wrapped the appropriate ornaments in tissue paper.  I put them all in the box.  I replaced the masking tape, put the box back on the top shelf, and closed the sliding door with a resounding BANG!

Whew!  Mission accomplished in about two minutes flat.  See?  Patience and planning do pay off.