I went to my first meeting of CLA last night. (Yes. Clutterers Anonymous. Sigh. It is not yet true that there is a 12-Step program for every unattractive human habit, but we may get there some day.)

It was a tiny group of people in a little room in a church, and the meeting began 15 minutes late. Keep in mind that I'm used to DA meetings, which start strictly on time and use timers to keep the speaker and everyone who shares precisely on track. (Speakers get 15 minutes: no more and no less. Sharing is confined to three minutes per person. In DA we're strict and clear about time, just as we strive to be strict and clear about money.)

There is this odd thing about clutterers getting together, whether in CLA or in DA meetings that focus on clutter: the rooms are always small. The surroundings never feel abundant. This partly reflects the fact that CLA is one of the smallest 12-step groups out there, and partly reflects our willingness to confine ourselves to small spaces. My den, for example, tends to consist of a little path from the door to my computer, with the rest of the floor covered in books, papers, and magazines. (Do you remember those films they used to show pre-teens at school to explain menstruation?--the visual of the uterus, and how its lining would grow and grow until there was nearly no room left? That's what happens to my personal spaces: the walls start to close in as the piles of paper creep inward toward the middle of each room. This is in fact a good way for a uterus to behave--but not so much for a house.)

Everyone at this meeting was homely and at least a little overweight. I didn't fit in, or at least I sort of hoped (on some level) that I didn't.

I will probably go back. Because 1) "no contempt prior to investigation," and 2) for all I know, this isn't about my getting. It might well be about me giving. There could someone I might be able to help by going there. It's possible, and I need to check it out thoroughly.
As we went out to the parking lot together after the meeting we beheld a huge ramp that was being constructed adjacent to the church. Someone mentioned that a skateboarding movie was going to be shot on this ramp, once it was completed. Another remarked they had heard after the movie was finished it was going to be demolished, and all the lumber simply thrown away.

"What a waste," another member exclaimed. "I'll have to come by to get some of it."

And not a word from anyone else in the group.

I believe this might answer my question about how, in CLA, one defines "abstinence." In a lot of cases, one simply doesn't.

Posted by: Attila at 10:40 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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