Boots On My Partner's Mind

That's a switch, isn't it?  My partner is not the Bootman in our family -- far from it.  He will wear them for me on special occasions, but I digress....

My partner truly is "Mr. Neat-Nick."  Everything has a place, and everything should be in its place, or it goes.  His "Rule #1" for our home is, "volume in = volume out."  If I come home with something, then I have to pick something else equally as large and dispose of it ... somewhere, somehow.  That includes boots... well, at least, the boxes that they come in.

Over the last couple of years since we last configured my boot display and storage options, my boot collection has grown a little (um... define "a little," he asks...LOL!)  While I have sold or disposed of five pairs of boots, another 20 pairs have shown up at my door and have managed to get onto my feet.

Last week, in the period between Christmas and New Year's, my partner was off work.  I was working, but working from home.  Every few hours, I would hear my partner rummaging around, then huffing and puffing.  Finally, last Thursday night, he said, "we have to do something about all those boots!" (emphasis added.)

But rather than argue, he said, "look, you've built a boot room in the basement, and I have my model train set up in there.  Let's take down the train and put it away for now, and build some more shelves."

Of course, that plan sounded more simple than it really was.  In order to make room to store his model train setup in the utility room, we had to remove a bunch of junk that wound up in there.  Mostly -- boot boxes.  But there was some other stuff, too, including an old chair that we had always intended to have reupholstered, but was lumpy and uncomfortable.  Out it went, along with all that other junk ... to fill the back of my truck and take it to the dump (which here in snoburbia, we call it a transfer station) ... but I digress!

We went to a local home supplies store on Saturday to buy the supplies that I needed to build more shelving.  It has wood sides, but wire shelves.  The wire allows air to circulate and keep down any potential problem with mold that loves to grow in dark places on cellulose products (i.e., leather soles of boots).

We built the shelves, then arranged my boots, from tallest on the bottom to shortest on the top.  Now, 30 more pairs of boots have an official "home."  My partner is happy to clean up the place, get rid of junk, and get my boots off the floor of the bedroom closet (and other places where they found themselves to be).  I am happy to use my boot storage room for the reason it was designed.

While the shelves are adjustable, it is unlikely that I will change the distance between them.  I have one row at 14" for additional cowboy and mid-size motorcycle boots; two shelves at 12" for shorter work, combat and skydiving boots; one shelf at 20" for patrol and equestrian boots; and one shelf at 22" (bottom) for my real tall motorcycle boots (mostly custom Wescos.)  I had a small shelf "left over" on which I store miscellaneous boot supplies, such as boot hooks, boot jacks, shoe/boot polish, furniture polish (for plastic-coated boots like stock Dehners), rags, leather conditioner, lug-sole scrub-brush, and the like.

I also have a laundry sink in that room which makes it easy to clean the lug soles of my boots when they get dirty -- gotta keep those dirt clots out of the soles so I don't drop them everywhere else in the house when I walk around.

Life is short: put everything in its place!