Before wrapping up my interview with Marie Kondo, who might well be world¡¯s foremost cleaning consultant, I promised I would put one of her de-cluttering lessons to the test prior to reviewing her book ¡°The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up.¡± And so here I am in my narrow hallway, between the entrance and the living room, with a Mount Fuji-sized pile of more than 200 books.
The KonMari method boils down to this: Discard that which does not bring joy to your life. She advises being tactile, but when clearing out books she warns against dipping in and out of pages. ¡°Reading clouds your judgment.¡± I manage to toss a few, until I run my hand down the spine of my unfinished copy of ¡°Ulysses,¡± bookmarked at page 181. It pains me that I haven¡¯t finished it. Will I ever? Should I just chuck it and get on with my life as Kondo advises? James Joyce doesn¡¯t give a twopenny damn, but Marie Kondo does. Oh, bother.
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