Oh January, you wily creature, you. After the joyful upheaval of the holidays I am always desperate for you to arrive. We remove the Christmas tree from the living room and suddenly our crowded space seems limitless. A clean slate! Room to do cartwheels again!

And a week later, once the recycling truck has come and gone with an obscene amount of cardboard, I turn to my office and to my own aspirations for the new year.

And much like the tree and the living room, I search for space for my dreams and plans to stretch out and prepare for their own cartwheels.

My method usually starts with a good purging and a few thousand clear, plastic boxes. In my mind, there is no transition problem that can’t be solved with clear boxes and a label-maker.

In the midst of the sorting and the tossing, the lists and the goals, I aim to remember that my lofty 2012 resolutions also include this simple dictate: Have more fun.

To keep me focused on that essential goal, I add something to my office that needs neither clear box nor label…a print of the above photo with the following caption, overheard just the other day:

“Dad, come over here and build. It’s not just the organizing that’s fun.”