Hah. And with any luck some of your light fingered guests help you reduce your collection.
But seriously I think the appeal of these things also reflects a completely different lifestyle. These days if you really think you'll have unexpected overnight guests you'll have a sleeper sofa instead of a Murphy Bed. My wife collects Singer Featherweight portable electric sewing machines. With the low cost of new and used clothes plus so few learning to sew I can't think of anything more absurdly useless. Although in her defense she's made use of it herself I don't think anyone under 40 would have any use for it unless they're trying to start a retro YouTube channel.
I keep my bell-bottom jeans, disco ball, lava lamp, and wide ties because I'm pretty sure they'll come back in style eventually, sometimes twice. However, keeping all that stuff drives my spouse crazy. My parents' furniture from the late 1950's is quite in style now.
It's better to have a great collection of one brand / type than to have a lot of scattered stuff. Remember: anything you need to maintain is a burden. Cars, houses, pinball machines, old computers.
By choice I've been living out of a suitcase for 19 months now. As a stuffoholic and someone that kind of likes fashion it's been an interesting experience.
Dumb stuffoholic examples. I hate that I can't have more than 2 pairs of shoes. I need one dress pair for when I go to a wedding etc and I need one pair I can hike in, exercise in etc. I'd really prefer 2 or 3 more but there's no room.
I can't buy anything without throwing something away except software, ebooks... I'd prefer more computers (had 6 before this episode) all of which I used (Windows, OSX, & Linux). I run VMs on my laptop but the perf isn't there to be able to run various apps I'd like to run (games and other graphically intensive apps). Similarly I can't own an XBoxOne or PS4 as much as I would like to play.
Another interesting thing when preparing to do this and getting rid of lots of my stuff was just how much stuff is probably actually useful but only seldomly. An obvious sample might be a winter coat. You only need it in winter so it stays in storage for 9 months of the year. But, there's plenty of things I use less often. A paper cutter. A mac screw driver. A drill. An xacto knife. A hole punch. A pizza stone. A casserole dish. A printer. A scanner. I could list 1000s things. I don't know if having them is really having too much stuff. It seems rather it's semi freeing. If I want to make some crafts today I don't need several days of running around acquiring the stuff as I have it and can start immediately. If I want to cook something I most likely have all the utensils even if I only use them a couple of times a year. If I want to make something or repair something I have several drawers of tools.
So sure, we can have too much stuff (I had 44 pair of shoes of which I only ever used 5 or 6) but it's hard to say where the balance is.
I love getting rid of stuff. I've just packed up my apartment again, and my wife and I have under 5m3 of stuff, and that includes a couple of larger pieces of furniture, 7-8 framed pieces of art, a decently-sized toolbox, and a big TV. Most of the time we're away from our homebase anyway, so living out of two suitcases. It really means that our treasured items are treasured, as most have undergone several iterations of this slimming process.
It's not for everyone, and I'm not trying to make some larger moral point, but for me it always feels so cathartic to strip down the stuff and just be left with items that you actually really like
It's nice to see I'm not the only person in the thread thinking this. I have an unwieldy subset of items that belong in the "do this often enough that renting is cost prohibitive, and you can't digitize Physical Hobby X."
Board games my wife and I enjoy sharing; my archery equipment; snorkel and dry bag; guitar, etc. As it is, it's a good thing my dad was a tool junky (and master craftsman), so he didn't mind my storing all my woodworking and hobby electronics gear in his garage.
Yeah, if my only occupations were programming and media consumption, it would be a lot easier to live out of a suitcase, but physical activities are kind of amazing.
Simple, but clever idea. I keep telling my wife our house is for people to live in, not a warehouse for her books, memorabilia and kids toys. I'll try anything to keep our house livable.
I have two young children, I don't have time to "haunt" anything. But before we had kids we tried this with consignment stores, would spend like a year looking for some simple piece of furniture, and end up with junk anyway.
I want to add one thing here: Owning is sometimes also a burden. There is a whole sub culture focusing on downsizing (there are fans which are owning less than 100 items .. and that includes battery cable).
There are perhaps collections, and also collections.
The author isn't really talking about physical objects that accumulate around the house seemingly all by themselves. The author's talking about collections that are deliberately, lovingly curated as a labor of love.
The difference is critical. It's not entirely unlike how I knit and sew purely for pleasure, while my grandmother did so because her family couldn't afford off-the-rack items. The physical details of the two activities might be similar, but what was actually happening there was radically different.
I have one friend whose house is basically probably a candidate for one of the hoarders shows. Then my dad and brother are both basically of the nothing out of place school.
I tend to be the Goldilocks principle. I do get rid of things that I know I'll never use--especially if they're bulky. But I don't mind keeping things around that I may get back into someday. Or want for the occasional thing. And I can keep some magazines and piles of books lying around, seasonal clothing piles, travel stuff grab boxes, etc. laying around without them taking over. If people were coming over, I might spend an hour tidying up but it's a happy medium for me for the most part.
I can't wait for the day when I can walk to my local dump and move into a mcmansion somebody threw out because the paint was the wrong color... And I am only half joking.
Go into your local thrift store and try not to gasp as you walk past $300 pair of designer jeans after $400 dress, some of them still with tags on them as they've never been worn, and most all of them in seemingly brand-new condition.
It's a consumer's dream world out there, baby.
And we can't seem to get enough.
Storage units weren't even a thing 75 years ago. Now they're ubiquitous.
The idea of paying rent to store things you'd never use to our grandparents was insanity. (It still is imho).
I'm going thrifting right now, actually.
To everybody else in the world, if you could take a break from buying more brand new clothing, to consider why you might not need to buy more brand new clothing, we would all be a lot better off imho.
If you have family, check in before you give the heirloom toy away, your brother or sister may kill you if they're harbouring dibs on it.
I am still not forgiven for throwing away one half of Johnsons dictionary, the one with the "oats" joke despite it being mostly damaged, beyond repair and unsellably filthy.
I'm writing this looking at a 15th or 16th C wooden stool my mother rescued from a skip. Kondo would have done for it when Chippendale or Sheraton were alive if not before. Now I have a 21st century flat with 21st century life and a 500 year old oak stool I still use to change light bulbs.
I'm a hoarder by nature, I have a hard time getting rid of old magazines and broken VCRs. But I'm not a minimalist, either, I need tools (for example) to work on my car and other projects that I enjoy.
Look for me on a future episode of "Hoarding: Buried Alive".
My wife's parents got stuck cleaning out my wife's grandparents house when they moved to assisted living. It was enough of an eye-opener that they did a huge purging when they got back home and ended up moving into a sparsely-furnished garden home. Even after slimming down, they continue to divest themselves of things. We are very grateful to know that we won't have a nightmare on our hands when it is time for us to help them move.
My family is another story. My dad is a collector of all sorts of things: vintage toys, LGB trains, 1930s radios, fine guitars... He has a 40' long storage unit just full of stuff. I dread the day we have to deal with it all.
People want to own less stuff, we move around more, do less DIY etc., having stuff is a PITA.
I often want to rent things though, maybe I want a set of glasses for a big party or a steam cleaner to get the wine spill out that happened during the big party. I usually buy that stuff now because it's so much easier than renting.
I absolutely hate how older folks seem to covet things they're sentimental about. Lock it in a box or display case and never make it a part of your life. Fuck that - when I inherit the things that remind me of my mom or dad I'm going to use them until they become useless. I will love them for their use, and not treat them like something to be kept on a shelf or in a locked safe.
I'm going to keep my dining room table laid out nice like it's Christmas Dinner everyday and I will not cry over the stains that accumulate.
The sad irony is when I inherit my parents' nice things I will then be putting my parents in a box.
But seriously I think the appeal of these things also reflects a completely different lifestyle. These days if you really think you'll have unexpected overnight guests you'll have a sleeper sofa instead of a Murphy Bed. My wife collects Singer Featherweight portable electric sewing machines. With the low cost of new and used clothes plus so few learning to sew I can't think of anything more absurdly useless. Although in her defense she's made use of it herself I don't think anyone under 40 would have any use for it unless they're trying to start a retro YouTube channel.
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