March 18: George Carlin, one of my favourite comedians, used to do a monologue about stuff: the stuff we own; the stuff we collect; how we store our stuff; how we ultimately become prisoners to our stuff. It was very funny, and very insightful.
Lately, I have been thinking a lot about my stuff. When I moved 3 years ago, I was forced to go through my stuff and decide which pieces went with me, and which would be jettisoned or left behind. There was a certain amount of stuff thrown out or recycled, and most of my paintings remained in Marisa’s basement. So I moved here with a relatively small burden of stuff. Yet it has continued to grow.
The problem is that we tend to define who we are by our stuff. The house or condo we own, the clothes we wear, the car we drive all make a statement about our personality. It’s hard to imagine a life without a collection of stuff. That said, I am finding that stuff that was important to me at one stage of my life, is less important, or perhaps even irrelevant right now. For example, everyone has a collection of books. They got read at some point in time, and were kept because they were entertaining or insightful. They look good on the shelf, but in most cases, they never get opened again. I have three shelves of books that I haven’t opened in recent memory. Why keep them ?
And so the question becomes: how do I decide what stuff to keep, and what stuff to pitch out ? I recently heard someone say that we should only retain the stuff that has emotional resonance in our lives. The rest is clutter – stuff we can do without. So the crystal vase I was given by the Etobicoke staff when I got married is a keeper; the glass decanters that look good on the sideboard are recyclable.
It’s an interesting perspective, and one that I am using to consider cleaning house. That may be more difficult than I think. After all, I kept this stuff when I moved because I felt some level of emotional response to it. Yet it has recently begun feeling redundant and superfluous to my life, so the time feels right to begin the process of assessing my stuff to try and reduce the overburden of stuff I carry. It is a job best approached with perspective and a sense of humour. I think George would be gratified.