Stuff

Episode #783

February 3, 2024

Like everyone else, I accumulate an excess of stuff.

I bought a shed to store garage stuff.
We remodeled the bedroom closet to hold more stuff.
The back of the SUV has become useless with all the emergency stuff.
Even the Christmas stockings have overflow bags hanging off of them for extra stocking stuff.

I have always had a twelve month rule for stuff.
There are exceptions.
If stuff is stored and I do not use it for twelve months I keep it because it is a holiday decoration, memorabilia, a useful tool, or a likely usable material.
Otherwise, I get rid of it.

Christmas, camping, Thanksgiving and Easter boxes are kept year to year. Paula and I do cull them every time they are opened.

Memorabilia takes many forms. It is displayed as home deco or kept in the keepsake trunk. Some of it is stored in the garage because someone made it, we can’t part with it, or it doesn’t fit in the trunk.

Useful tools are not subject to the twelve month rule. They are, after all, useful tools.
The same is true of usable materials. Some day I will use that length of wiggle wire… really.

When Paula and I moved to Aguanga and down sized our house we had no room for 50% of our stuff. We broke the exception rule. Everything was under consideration for the garage sale. It was painful to put out the furniture that Paula’s father made. The large pieces of memorabilia were dragged kicking and screaming onto the driveway. 
No… wait… that was me.

Some holiday decorations, like the big bin of fake trees, were tagged for sale. Sheets of plywood and other “usable” materials joined the yard sale. We priced everything reasonably. After all, it was all valuable to us.

In the first 2 hours we sold $25 worth of tchotchkes. We slashed all the prices by 50%. In the next two hours we sold another $10 worth. With one hour remaining I put out a big sign which said, “FREE. TAKE IT AWAY.”

A woman arrived in a pickup truck. She trotted out what might have been rent-a-kids (for the purpose of getting sympathy prices). I assured her that everything was free. She filled the truck with my stuff. The kids seemed genuinely excited about the games and the woman was thrilled to have the furniture and the fake trees.

I have not missed any of the stuff that disappeared at the garage sale. I do not regret my annual purging.

George Carlin pointed out in a comedy routine that a suitcase is a miniature version of your stuff so you can take your stuff with you on a trip. He also said that moving to a bigger house was primarily to have more room for your stuff.

I have found that leaner, simpler and streamlined is satisfactorily efficient.
Besides, I have clear, vivid snapshots of my stuff in my memory.
I never really have to part with my stuff.

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