Stuffy Stuff
I don’t have very many things, relatively speaking. A computer, two pairs of sunglasses (one of which isn’t mine, thank you Rita), a bookshelf, a teddy bear, some boxes, a head scratcher. A small library of used books. Fifteen t-shirts. One pair of jeans. Two dress up outfits. An office chair. My lovely bicycle. Three pictures of Europe. A leather bag. A suitcase.
I recently discovered, while Rita was helping me move from Boston to Maine, that everything I own fits in one half of a pickup truck. Everything Rita owns fits in the other half. Perhaps this means I am not a good American, but the lack of “stuff” in my life brings me great pleasure and pride. I may bore people with my tired, repetitive outfits, and most of my stuff shows some wear and tear. But the benefits that have come from my continual slimming down of objects every time I undertake a move (which these days is quite often) are plentiful.
ASIDE: There is an excellent book that can be found here that shows the posessions of several families around the world. They have unloaded all of their stuff onto their front lawns. Seeing some of the families from destitute nations makes me sound like a sincere materialist. And wait until you see the family from Texas.
I won’t take the high and mighty road of discussing how being a minimalist is a “green” way to live, but rather I’d like to talk about how rich my relationships with my few items has become. When I was younger, vacuuming used to be my least favorite chore. I would make a big production of moving around the furniture, dragging the cord, adjusting and readjusting the proper nozzle. But I often found myself talking to the vacuum and the objects around it. I would run the vacuum into a bedside table. “Sorry vacuum,” I’d say. “Sorry bedside table.” I was a weird kid.
I’m a full grown weird adult now, and I find my love for the objects around me has intensified. Right now I’m wearing a plain white t-shirt, and feeling its familiar thin cotten on my torso is like a hug from a good friend. Leonard, my teddy bear and perhaps my oldest possesion, knows more about me than most of my friends. I adore him, and if anything were to happen to him I’d be devastated.
This brings up the question, for me, of what makes something alive. I know I feel alive, I live, breathe and think. Autumn, my dog is alive, because she intearcts with me, moves on her own fruition, and snores when she sleeps. Plants are alive because they grown and change, they have a life cycle, the breath my air and give me theirs. But what about objects? If I love something inanimate, does that give it any value on the specturm of “liveliness”? My bookshelf gives me joy, it changes as time goes on, its contents and shape give it personality. It’s alive to me as anything.
I don’t think it would be possible, however, to have such a dear love for these objects, to see them as alive, if I had more of them. Having few objects allows me to spend more individual time with each one, to develop a relationship, and to feel comforted by them. It is the difference of living with strangers or with a loving family. If you have too many objects, you can only get close to your favorites, and the others slip by the wayside. So why not slim down to just the favorites? It brings mental clarity, and if your house catches on fire you don’t have too many things to choose from to save. Or too many things lost.
Stuff, stuff, stuff. What is it? Why do we need it? And perhaps the most puzzling question of all, where does it come from? Now’s the part of the blog where I promote an excellent website that looks into this question in a friendly yet serious way. Check out Annie Leonard’s visual discussion of stuff You won’t be disappointed.
