Hello, my name is Marie and I'm a piler.

I suffer from piles. Piles of work, piles of papers, piles of clothing. My home is full of piles.
In my sons' room there are piles of toys, piles of dirty clothes and piles of books. I ask them to pick up the piles and they do, but within 48 hours they're back again, the contents rearranged, but in much the same spots as they were before, as if there were pile magnets in the corners and under the bed.
Some piles are when-I-get-around-to-it piles. The one on top of the desk is the to-be-filed pile. Some piles are piles-in-transition. The lump next to the front door is the things-to-be-brought-up-the-stairs pile, part of which will be added to the clothes-to-be-put-away pile on top of one son's dresser and another part of which will be put on the pile-to-be-brought-up-to-the-attic.
Some piles are promises. I put photos in piles with the idea that I promise to sort them into albums at some future date.
Some piles are guilt piles. There is a pile of magazines on my coffee table that I haven't had time to read but since I bought the subscription I feel I ought to at least riffle them once before I give up entirely and throw them away.
Some piles are object lesson piles, like the pile of videos and dvds, not in their cases, which I refuse to put away because I didn't get them out and if I continually pick up after certain people in this house they'll never learn to pick up after themselves and will turn out to be pigs and no one will ever marry them and I'll be stuck with them and their piles forever.
Some piles are permanent. On the shelf of the entertainment center is an "electronics pile" where I throw headphones, game boys, joysticks and memory cards, because it's pointless to leave them on the floor all day for when certain people get home from school in the afternoons. I mean, sometimes I need to walk on it.
There are change of plan piles, like the one in the corner of the living room with stuff that I planned to sell in my garage sale which I was going to have because I thought we'd be moving, but since we're not moving, at least not any time soon, it's still there in the corner along with the pile of cardboard boxes that I was planning to use to pack up the stuff I didn’t sell.
Some piles are indecisive. Like the pile of scarves and mittens still sitting by the back door because I haven’t convinced myself that just because it’s May it won’t still snow next week.
Sometimes piles are sentimental. In my basement, I have piles of sketchbooks and letters and drawings and sculptures, things that I made or that friends sent or that my children brought home from school. Piles of feelings and memories that I can’t bear to throw away.
Sometimes piles beget other piles, like the sock basket with paired socks in it, a direct spinoff of the original sock basket that contains socks with no matches yet but might someday when the dryer decides to spit them back out.
Sometimes piles are spontaneous, like the piles of shoes, jackets and backpacks that suddenly accumulate on the floor by the front door whenever the kids come home from school.
When I had cleaning help, my piles got transformed into stacks. Once a week, the piles would go from being mixed up messes to neat and orderly stacks of like things, all the papers and books over here, all the toys over there, all the dirty clothes down in the basement next to the washer. I’d look at the stacks and feel like I was making progress with my piles because they were organized.
I admit that I have guilt over the sheer numbers of piles in my house. I’ve checked out piles of books on the subject of clearing the piles away. It always results in my feeling energized about getting rid of the piles, until I realize that until and unless I can get all the rest of my household to feel the same way, the piles will keep coming back. I’m assuming here that when half of my household leaves to start their own lives somewhere else, the piles in my life will diminish in size and scope. I know some people who thought the piles in their house were because they had kids, but when the kids left they had to admit that it was themselves and not their children who had been the pilemakers all along. I suspect I’m heading toward the same revelation down the road.
I wonder, is the propensity to produce piles genetic? Are my children doomed to have piles, too? Or is it something I can train them to avoid? How would that be possible if I’m the one that’s teaching them to make piles in the first place? Is there a twelve step program for dealing with piles? Maybe I could start one. “Hello. My name is Marie Marfia and I’m a piler.”
I’m planning on moving my office from my basement to a new space this summer and for a while I contemplated having a pile free existence. What would it be like to work in a room with no piles in it? Bare floored and with corners that I could see into, table tops with nothing on them, except of course, the pile of computers and scanners and printers that I need to do my job. Hmm. Piles seem to follow me wherever I go. But it’s fine. I have a pile of ideas about what to do about it.