Junk Drawer

Do you have a junk drawer in your house? Did your Mother have a junk drawer? Do Fathers have junk drawers or is that what garages are for? In Dad’s garage, there are screws and nails in every possible size, for every possible use. Old paint from decades ago. Solvents, machine oils, cans of WD-40. Old tobacco tins filled secret Dad stuff.

There was a box of Christmas bulbs. My Dad asked me where it came from? I lied. I said I didn’t know, but my friends and Inhad a habit of unscrewing Christmas lights from the neighbor’s houses. We would visit this girl in the neighborhood. Her Dad said we couldn’t visit her any more until we found his missing Christmas lights and screwed them back in. Hence the box of them in the garage.

Doohickeys, watchamacallits. Thingamajigs.

The definition of junk drawer from Word Sense lists the first published reference to “junk drawers” back in 1912, from a dentist in New York. He referenced his “junk drawer” in the context of keeping all of his gadgets handy to where he was working.

Does the junk drawer hold the seeds of a future hoarder? How many cats can fit in a junk drawer?

Christmas must be over, because it’s time to organize our junk drawer, which we call the utensil drawer, giving us the illusion that we don’t have a junk drawer.

The utensil drawer did not set out to become the junk drawer. But over time, things have a way of accumulating. Like dust. Grime. Schmatte.

These are some of the things that we are getting rid of today. Some have lost their edge, dulled or replaced by newer and better versions. Then we find tools that exist only to make us laugh. Seriously, what is a mayo knife? Why would someone have one?

The Mayo knife- because it is shaped to get it all out.

I guess we don’t require that level of specialization anymore. Some genius took the time to invent this cool mayo knife, and here we are tossing it out like yesterday’s news. How are we going to feel when that almost empty jar of mayo is left now with mayo that we can’t get out? Will we feel the pain of diminishing entropy? How will that affect our mood or our standard of living?

And what the hell is this pink thing?

A cannoli roller? Something to put the dog’s tail in so you can see it when walking her in the dark? Does it belong in the bathroom? Or the bedroom? My imagination fails me with this one.

Why about the pear corer? Did we ever use it? Well, I did. I got it for free at a farmers market. I used it more than once, but Michelle never used it. So today it is going.

Then there is the dull rasp, and I’m not referencing my voice. What is the use of a dull rasp? There is the extra ice cream scoop. The sharpening set that didn’t really sharpen very well. The tenderizer mallet that doesn’t go in the dishwasher, but was put into the dishwasher anyway. It still works, but your hand gets black when you use it.

Welcome to the home of stocking stuffers from previous Christmases. Gadget hell.

What about my collection of plastic forks?

As soon as I said the word collection, my mInd went to that special place where Marie Kondo is tied up with Mom’s yarn. A myriad of past collections, like bad decisions, come to mind.

My remaining Cassette tapes can see they are next in this post-Christmas cull, all leading up to that New Year’s countdown.

Of course we need a cherry pitter. But two of them?

We have Spatulas for Flipping and Turning a.k.a. Flippers and Turners. We have spreaders, scrapers, and mayo knives.

Do we really need two bench scrapers? My daughter and I shout out at the same time, “Of course we do.” Mom backs down.

This is the age old quest to find the right tool for the job. In the beginning there were rocks. And rocks were good. Then man wanted a bigger rock. And woman wanted a sharp rock to cut with, and a rock for the wash. Then it got fancy. Then it just got weird. Too many choices. How many rocks do we really need?

Or is this like the Warren Zevon’s obsessive compulsive habit of buying gray Calvin Klein t-shirts?

Is this simply our need to have a spare? Something we can use to avoid having to go into the dishwasher, and get out the dirty, unwashed tool and God forbid having to wash it by hand?

My brother had a friend who was a shop teacher. One day, he asked one his students for a wrench.

What kind of wrench Mr. F?

Doesn’t matter.

I’m going to use it as a hammer anyway.

Here is the clean drawer. It is a work of art. It keeps our marriage together.

And on the counter….

My plastic fork collection sacrificed so the cassettes can sleep another day.