Compact

It was Merril’s turn to pick a word in the dictionary.  The word her finger fell on was “compact.”  It seemed really appropriate to me.  This dictionary is quite weighty.  There was a large spider on our floor.  I found a book and threw it on him.  The dictionary.  We do not do such things if spiders are outside, but inside is our place.  He is way more compact now.
We are making things more compact around the home.  Stuff in one place we are culling and moving what remains to another. We had to do that in the shed when we had it lined.  Once we had places to put table tennis bats etc around the walls.  Now the walls have no shelves so what we do not hang is in well concealed containers that are easy to get to.
I must admit I tend compact stuff wherever I live.  I tend to know every square centimetre of a place so I know what can be used for what.  At one place I owned I did not do any planting for a year while I saw what the sun did.  Only then did I feel confident to put certain plants in certain places knowing how much sun they would get.
I am probably a sad case, but I tend to put like with like.  Each thing has its place and goes in that location so that when I want such a thing I know where to look.  I tend to be pretty rigid about putting things back as, sure as eggs ,if I don’t I will want it and not have a clue where it is.  I am happy to accept responsibility for things I put somewhere.
We have been making our bookshelves more compact.  We decide what we need, and the rest goes.  There has been a subtle change of thinking lately.  Once upon a time things would be kept just “in case.’  Now we think “we haven’t used it, we are not likely to use it, so why keep it?”
I actually like it when people keep speeches compact.  Too often it seems some go on and on.  What may have started as interesting becomes for me an endurance test.  I do not know how people sat through four-hour speeches and the like.  They say the head cannot take in more than the seat can endure.
I like to try and be compact in what I say.  My thinking is “what would I like?”  I reckon it is fairly unfair to ask someone to put up with what I would not be happy to put up with.  Though people tend to give their opinion with their feet.  A crowd can become not many if they feel they will need to put up with rambling.
It seems to me this compact thing has heaps of applications.  To me the Japanese were really good at it.  They had limited space and seem to have used it well.  I do not go for compact for compacts sake, but I am not into wastage if I can help it.  Acting like something is infinite when no resource on earth is that way.  Compact for me is making the most of what I have.