Let's talk about stuff. The stuff that we crave, covet, pursue, stash and hoard.
The thing about things is that they outlive us. Look around the room you are in. Barring natural disaster, everything in it will last longer than you do, or at least it can. There are things that come and go, of course. Rubber bands, pens, bobby pins and paper clips seem to originate at the point of purchase and then slowly dissolve back into the air to be purchased all over again. And paper, in the form of mail, notes, and to-do lists, seems to do just the opposite, multiplying, spreading and clogging up the room like flat, white tribbles.
But the objects, for example, a computer, a metal desk lamp, a framed Polaroid, a picture of Karen and Abbie, a picture of my grandfather, a photo card reader and a painted rock my mother made for me on my fourth birthday. Many of these things will remain with me my entire life. If the lamp breaks, I will reluctantly throw it away, likewise the computer, though most likely both will linger in the garage for years before making it to the disposal site, if past lamps and computers are any indication. You never know which things will go the distance, but they are there somewhere around you already.
When I look at magazines about homes, I'm always drawn to the lean, simply decorated ones, or the ones that look as though every piece was hand-selected by former Pottery Barn stylists. Although I know I loved everything I have once, when I brought it home, I don't love everything now.
In fact, right now we live in a home that was furnished when we arrived. We've become accustomed to the excessive curves of the sofa and the giant bed we had to buy new sheets for on the first night we slept here, and the rattle of the handles on the dresser that signals whoever is still sleeping that the morning routine has begun. But when we leave someday, this stuff will stay, ready for another round of property managers.
So here I am, in my early 40s, with a lot of little stuff and no big stuff of my own. The vintage red chenille sofa is long gone, the platform bed dissembled. I do have a plain dresser with vintage glass knobs that belonged to my grandmother and was used by my father. And this desk, which is oak and not my style, but which I got for a very good price. It serves its purpose.
"Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful." (William Morris) Easier said than done. How useful are eight sets of headphones? How useful are a thousand books, some I'll never read again, some I've never read at all? A stack of magazines two feet high, four single-hole-punches, all the same? The things that are hardest are the things that are beautiful, or were beautiful to someone else, and now sit in a box or a drawer. Likewise the things that are useful, but not right this second. These are the things that someday someone will find in that same box or drawer or another one and say, "What was Tamara thinking? What does this mean?"
And yet they remain and we are helpless against them. It is so hard to let things go, once they are infused with meaning, even if their only significance is that they have become ours. It's more than hard-- it's painful. To think that they might not be cherished as much as we once cherished them, even when we no longer do. To think that there will be a space where they once were that has nothing in it, and that the thing, the framed card from someone we don't remember, or the wind-up godzilla, or the oak desk, will go on and perhaps end up in a thrift store with a ten-cent price tag or worse, (much, much worse), go to WASTE in a landfill, this is just too much to bear.
So we keep. And we squirrel away. And we file and stack and shelve and cram, and then one day we are weighted down by all that we have and all that we have saved and we feel like we can't breathe anymore and it all has to go, but how and where, and oh, not this little one right here, because that is very special... all the memories clinging like glistening webs to every single piece keep us mired in and tethered to things.
The thing is, things can be let go, to continue on their paths, coming from wherever they came from and going wherever they are going to go. If we can sort out what's precious from what's just passing through, maybe we can lighten our load just a little bit.
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(George Carlin once said, "your stuff is stuff, other people's stuff is sh*t". Funny routine NSFW. Damn he was funny. RIP.)
Here's an interesting reflection on stuff from the movie The Labyrinth: YouTube link. I find myself remembering this when I set out on a mission to sort and discard and wind up sprawled on the floor with an old book amid papers and tchotchkes an hour later. Hoarders with legs. Note: despite the fact that the giggle-inducing phrase "manipulating her junk" is used, this is also a neat insight into the puppetry involved in the film, which has become a cult classic.
