Does It Have My Credit Card Number, Too?

At some point in childhood, lots of kids think of their closets as sources of magic, portals to exotic locations both real and fantasy. Ultimately, this can be an excellent source of imagination development, and soon the closet resumes its original purpose of closet storage, with the added bonus of housing whatever other crap that can be stuffed inside. But today, I have evidence that the closet of my youth is magic. It is a generator. Of completely random stuff.

Over the years, my mom would make a comment about the various things I’d left in that closet. To be honest, I didn’t really miss anything that might have been in there, so I didn’t really pay attention (sorry, Mom). But this week, she noticed that the upper shelf had started a slow decent toward the floor. That was her perspective anyway, that the shelf had finally broken. I can’t remember when it actually cracked off the wall the first time, but I think it was back in high school. I could handle a hammer and knew where Dad kept the tools. (Again, sorry Mom.)

Unfortunately for me, just nailing the shelf back up and shoving the miscellaneous contents back on top it is wasn’t an option for my mother. She decided to clean out the closet. And in doing so, she would transfer said contents to its original owner. Oh no.

When she started listing the items she’d found over the phone, I couldn’t remember anything. Not a single thing. A fancy glass serving tray. A cookbook with recipes from diners across America. Fully wrapped Christmas gifts with Post-it notes designating the intended recipients. Huh? Where did all of this stuff come from?

The answer is obvious. The closet is making stuff. Either that or it has a terrible and bizarre shopping addiction that it’s trying to pin on me. And it’s succeeding. At this moment, I have no fewer than 4 giant boxes in the trunk of my car with everything my closet decided I needed in it. I’m too scared to bring it in the house in case it carries this stuff-generating germ that will infect the closets here, and God help us because we are totally out of room and can’t handle new stuff indiscriminately showing up to take up space.

I’m trying to look at this from the bright side. I think I just cut my annual gift budget in half.

But Mom should have an exorcism for that closet, just in case.