Confessions of a dangerously cluttered mind

Getting organized is big business. There are entire stores devoted to selling you the fantasy that your otherwise untamable clutter can be tamed by a few brightly coloured baskets, bins and funky gizmos.

And I am so easily seduced by anything that promises to make order out of a mountain of mittens in every size from newly arrived to leaving-for-college; to say nothing of that mysterious tangle of AC adaptors and electrical cables that might have belonged to something someone once owned.

Whether it's the crispness of the air in September or the need to make room for all those fresh new school supplies, each year at this time I get swept away by this wave of organizational optimism: this sense that this will finally be the year when I manage to create order out of the chaos of family life.

Given how many articles on getting organized and banishing clutter I've been coming across lately, I don't think I'm the only one thinking steamy thoughts about under-the-bed storage-or tuning into shows that show you how it's done in graphic detail, like Clean Sweep.

Yep. I have a secret fascination with these shows-but in a rather sinister way. I'd love it if someone did a Candid Camera-type follow-up a year or two after the fact, to see if the de-cluttering magic actually sticks: if the moms who were forced to throw away 90 per cent of their children's (something my ten-year-old considers inhumane to moms and to kids) actually stay with the program.

It's not that I want to embarrass the de-cluttering guinea pigs. I'm simply interested in finding out if the techniques work for die-hard packrats living in the real world (i.e. without the benefit of the services of a personal organizer). 

And, of course, what I really want to know is whether the moms zip outside to rescue their kids' artwork from the trash the moment the TV crew pulls out of the driveway.

I'm putting my money on "yes."