thoughts on "stuff"
I have way too much stuff - I obsessed about this a lot as I was trying to move it all from NH to NJ and am now thinking about it again as I start the preparation to move again. Actually, the last few days I've just been dealing with my clothes. I gave away a ton of stuff before I left NH to Goodwill and Dress for Success, and I'm already filled up several more bags, with more to come. I have enough clothes for at least three people. I'm not even sure how I acquired all of them on my non-profit salary over the last five years. Part of the problem, ironically, is that I take really good care of my clothes so most of them are in very good condition, even if some of them are ten years old. (I can't believe I'm old enough that I can still be wearing clothes that are ten years old - how on earth did that happen?) So it's hard to get rid of them, even if I don't wear them much. And I'm even worse with shoes and bags since you don't have to worry about fit. Plus, as my friend Heather would say, I have enough toiletries for an entire sorority in my bathroom.
The obsession with stuff extends, though, to many other things besides clothes. For example, I read at least 5 magazines a month, and I cannot throw them away/recycle them when I'm done reading them. When I was getting ready to leave NH, I had a full two years worth of magazines sitting in my apartment. And I couldn't get rid of them until I looked through all the articles I had doggy-eared and ripped out the pages that I wanted. Which now sit in a giant pile that I told myself I would organize during my time off and haven't done so yet. Then, there's the 200 or so pens that I have. (I'm not even kididng on that number - I've never actually counted all of them but have done some quick estimating, and I'm probably pretty close.)
I also have every single card or letter I've ever gotten. And I'm totally flummoxed by saving e-mail - while I know it's supposed to be transient and ephemeral, I have a hard time not saving all of them. So I have disks full of my e-mail from college, lots of work e-mails saved in various places, an AOL account that I can't let go of, etc. The saving also extends to all sorts of sentimental objects. I think this kind of saving is different from the above acquisition of objects - it just feels too much like if I let certain things go, it's like I'm also letting go of some piece of myself since these random objects often bring back memories that I have no recollection of until I see said object. So without the object to trigger those memories, they would just be gone entirely.
But the bottom line is that I simply have too much stuff of all sorts, and I really don't know how to break the habit. I don't move every year, but enough that it should help me clean out the stuff, and it just hasn't made a dent yet. So I'm trying again before I move this time, but I think I might just have to come to terms with the fact that I'm a stuff-aholic...
The obsession with stuff extends, though, to many other things besides clothes. For example, I read at least 5 magazines a month, and I cannot throw them away/recycle them when I'm done reading them. When I was getting ready to leave NH, I had a full two years worth of magazines sitting in my apartment. And I couldn't get rid of them until I looked through all the articles I had doggy-eared and ripped out the pages that I wanted. Which now sit in a giant pile that I told myself I would organize during my time off and haven't done so yet. Then, there's the 200 or so pens that I have. (I'm not even kididng on that number - I've never actually counted all of them but have done some quick estimating, and I'm probably pretty close.)
I also have every single card or letter I've ever gotten. And I'm totally flummoxed by saving e-mail - while I know it's supposed to be transient and ephemeral, I have a hard time not saving all of them. So I have disks full of my e-mail from college, lots of work e-mails saved in various places, an AOL account that I can't let go of, etc. The saving also extends to all sorts of sentimental objects. I think this kind of saving is different from the above acquisition of objects - it just feels too much like if I let certain things go, it's like I'm also letting go of some piece of myself since these random objects often bring back memories that I have no recollection of until I see said object. So without the object to trigger those memories, they would just be gone entirely.
But the bottom line is that I simply have too much stuff of all sorts, and I really don't know how to break the habit. I don't move every year, but enough that it should help me clean out the stuff, and it just hasn't made a dent yet. So I'm trying again before I move this time, but I think I might just have to come to terms with the fact that I'm a stuff-aholic...