The Greater of Two Goods

A comment on a retirement blog got me thinking.  It was about how a person may want to live a freer mobile lifestyle in an RV or a boat, but at the same time they just bought a nice sofa set for the living room.  They believe that moving is not an option because it would mean giving up the new furniture.  The blogger’s point was the sofa set was holding them back from following their dreams.  In other words they are “owned by their stuff”.

I don’t think “owned” is the right word for it.  That person has made a choice without realizing it.  The choice to have the decked-out living room instead of living on a boat.

When I was younger I thought that all choices were between something good and something bad.  Do I keep the perfect condition blue shirt or the old green shirt with a hole in it?  Of course you keep the blue shirt because the other one is ripped.  But what if they are both in good condition?  A packrat will want to keep both because they are perfectly good.  The packrat mind doesn’t realize that real choices can be made between two good options.

The homeowner who dreams of a mobile life sees value in the freedom of living aboard a boat, and also values having a comfortable house.  Both choices are good.  It’s not that their life is being controlled by the furniture, just that the decision to stay in the house has been made.

Too many computers

Have this nagging feeling that I own too much computer stuff.  I have three laptop computers, and each one can be used for tasks that the others can’t do.  I can’t simplify the computer gear by selling a laptop, because that would sacrifice some functionality.  The question then becomes, instead of simplifying by reducing the hardware maybe I should first simplify by reducing the options that I need.  Do I have too much functionality available?  Are all these tech options necessary for a fulfilled life?

It seems that I am already at the minimum number of machines, and to reduce further would require giving up functionality.  What if this is a hoarding behavior? I’m not comfortable with having this many computers, but at the same time I did not consider giving up the ability to do some things.  It was the hoarding of features.

Strangely it did not occur to my stuff-centered mind that I might be able to grow by reducing the number of computer tasks my home computer is capable of doing.  I could see the hardware side, but just now understood the software side.  The packrat mind thinks only about what is in front if it (physical objects).  There is this idea that if the MacBook is sold, it means I’ll never again have a Mac, so this all will be lost.  That’s not really true because I will be keeping the data.  And I can always get a newer Mac later, the next time I upgrade.

Advice for a young one

You can have anything you want in this life, but you can’t have everything you want.

Suddenly Gone

Check out (this link) about a woman in Las Vegas who lives in a condominium that was next to another condo that was in foreclosure.  A company was hired to “trash out” the foreclosed property, which means taking absolutely everything out of the condo and throwing it all away.  In this case the company trashed out the wrong condo and now this woman has an empty home.

Per the article she lost, “My clothes, my wedding dress, baby pictures, wedding photos, my dishes, my towels, my jewelry, anything you could possibly have in your house.” She was ready to go through a dumpster to rescue some of it, but they couldn’t even tell her where it was thrown away.  Just came home one day and it was all gone.

I ran across this story a week ago on the web, but I keep thinking about it.  What a shock that must have been!  How would you or I feel if this was done to us?

She mentioned some “memory clutter” type stuff, which is always the hardest to let go of.  If there is a silver lining in this disaster, perhaps it is that she doesn’t have to decide what to keep and what to discard.  Of course I’m the one who wants to become a minimalist, and not everyone is like me.

Progress in 2009

The year is ending, so I’ll do an update on my goals for the year.

1. Desk + Five Boxes:

Did pretty well on this.  Books are in two boxes instead of one, and I haven’t gone through all my media stuff yet.  So there are eight boxes left, and I just need sorting time to get it to six boxes.

2. My Furniture:

I hesitated on getting rid of some of my furniture, but what I have left is in my room or in the garage loft right now.  This could be reduced further, but at least it’s no longer in the storage unit and is all out of the way.

3. Storage Unit:

As detailed in this post, the friend boxes are mostly still in storage.  I reached a point where I could not continue with the sorting, so this goal is a failure.  Have not been able to get rid of the storage unit yet.

Going forward I’ll be scanning through my old VHS tapes and converting anything I want to save to digital files so I don’t need the bulky tapes anymore.  I want to organize my non-digital photos in some way.  There are also a few DVDs that could be sold on eBay.  After that I’ll probably refocus on my computer stuff because having one desk and three computers (along with all their peripherals) isn’t very efficient.

Storing Things for Friend B

Spring of 2008 – Friend B was living 1400 miles south of here.  His apartment lease was up, he was having trouble find enough work, and was open to new opportunity.

An old girlfriend of his (let’s call her “H”) who lives near me had purchased a new larger house and was planning to move to the new house and rent out the old house.  “H” offered the old house to Friend B as a place to house-sit for the summer while he worked full-time, in exchange for helping to clean up the property to prepare for getting it rented.

So Friend B closed up his apartment, sold his furniture, and packed up everything that wouldn’t fit in his car into cardboard boxes, and mailed them all to me.  More than 30 large shipping boxes.  (My mailman was amused.)  I put them in the basement of the house where I’m staying, with permission from the owner.  The deal was that Friend B would find a job locally with no rent for the summer, then get a new apartment using the money he saved and the boxes would be moved to his new place.  Friend B drove north with a packed car, expecting an empty house that may need cleaning, painting, carpet shampoo, lawn mowing, etc.  He was almost broke and needed to get started interviewing for jobs.

When he arrived, “H” was still living in the old house, and had barely begun moving or cleaning up.  She made it clear that in exchange for this free rent, Friend B was to work full-time for her, doing odd jobs to fix up the NEW house and help sort through her possessions.  A tremendous amount of stuff/clutter was packed into every room of the old house.  He estimated she was at least a year away from being able to move.  He was also being treated like crap (no point in going into details here).  Friend B could not tolerate the situation and heard of a possible job opportunity back here he used to live.  So he left suddenly mid-summer.

Now it’s more than a year later.  Friend B is still living in temporary housing down south and trying to find steady work, also dealing with health issues.  The 30+ boxes are here in the basement, some of which were damaged in the flood last spring.  He says when he gets an apartment, he’ll send me postage money and I can mail them all back to him (quite a project, ten trips to the post office, heavy boxes).  Because of the poor condition of the boxes I think it makes more sense to rent a shipping container (from PODS.com?) that I can load up here at the house and have them move it on a truck.

Anyway, it depends on having a place to ship to.  I don’t blame him much for this, and he’s at least willing to talk about it unlike Friend A.  My landlord is tolerating the extended storage, but does want to renovate the basement which requires everything to be moved out.  Once again I got talked into being responsible for someone else’s stuff.  I have learned my lesson, never again.

Storing Things for Friend A

In 1998 I lost my apartment and moved everything I owned into a storage unit.  This began my four year period of semi-homelessness.  The storage unit is a symbol of that dark time, and I’d love to stop renting it.

Around mid-1999, Friend A’s mother was selling her house and moving to a small apartment.  Friend A was living in another state, but still had things stored in his mother’s garage and basement.  This was the house he grew up in, so it was a collection of mementos, books, projects, files, business inventory, etc. from the first 40 years of his life.  The house was sold, and the stuff had to be moved.  Friend A came back to town looking for a local place to temporarily store it because he didn’t have the space or resources to move it.

My storage unit cost me the same monthly fee no matter how much was in there, and it was not full.  So at the time it made sense to “temporarily” put Friend A’s stuff in my storage unit.  And it stayed!  The unspoken agreement was that as soon as he “hit it big” in business and had a place to move it to, it would be taken back.  To make a long story short, that didn’t happen.  He’s now living on the opposite side of the country, and not communicating much.

The storage unit was untouched for years because it was a sore subject.  I know what it’s like to have the entire contents of your personal history, your plans and dreams, packed away.  It’s like a lifeline, a connection with the potential that your dismal situation can possibly get better.  A point was reached a couple years ago when I could no longer tolerate the insanity of this situation.  I was able to overcome the need to keep hope for the future in boxes, by re-examining reasons why I kept everything.  And understanding that my life is in my mind & body, not in storage.  Made it my personal mission to stop renting the storage unit and began to sort through and get rid of things.

Didn’t touch Friend A’s stuff at first, but to stop renting the space I had to find a way to handle it.  Tried talking to him about it, but he always changed the subject or he suddenly had to go.  Probably the same issues I used to have about not being able to deal with having a “life” in storage.  I was willing to work with him long distance to sort through things via phone, email, and digital pictures.  Then ten months went by with no contact.  Things were damaged because the unit isn’t climate-controlled.  Some mold, rust, cobwebs, rodent damage.  Everything has a musty smell.

Goal was to reduce the physical volume of boxes to make it more manageable, so they could be shipped out or given to a member of his family.  I was afraid that if a family member saw the huge pile of musty boxes they would be as overwhelmed by it as I was and just walk away.  Decided that my approach would be:  For stuff that was merchandise or raw materials, sell it to help recoup some of the storage costs.  If it was hard to sell or ship, give away via Freecycle.  If it was garbage or something that could easily be replaced, throw it away or recycle.

Personal stuff was difficult.  Tried to keep only what was truly valuable and non-replaceable.  Started this process, but reached a point where I could not decide if something was a treasured memento or picked up at a garage sale (because it wasn’t my stuff!)  Without his input, the project stalled.  Gave up on it last May.

In recent months Friend A has sent a few emails, so at least I know he’s alive.  My stuff is all out of the storage unit now.  I’m continuing to pay rent just for his boxes.  My sister said tell him if he can’t pick it up by a certain date then it gets tossed (but I know for a fact that he can’t, even if he wanted to).  Told parts of this to a co-worker, and she was surprised I held onto it this long – thought I should throw it all in a dumpster.  My brother said he thinks I should have a big bonfire and burn it all up.  What do you think?

Storing Things for Other People

There are two people that I am storing things for.  The following two blog posts will attempt to explain why I am doing this.  Not make excuses, but to try and come to terms with how this happened and think about how I might get out of the situation.

I won’t use real names, so they will be called Friend A and Friend B.  Storing all this stuff has been an immense emotional burden, and a substantial financial one as well.  I believe it’s a giant roadblock on the path for me to regain an independent life.  I feel stuck here living in a rented bedroom in someone else’s house because of this.  Lately I’ve been thinking about buying a house, but if I do – would I take all this stuff with me?

The burden has been a motivator for me to purge a great deal of my own unused stuff, most of the year 2008 was spent on that project.  The purging stopped last spring because I was overwhelmed by other people’s things and could not continue.

Eye Glasses

All the eyeglasses I’ve worn since I was in 6th grade are still in my storage.  The frames that is.  There was a pair of loose lenses that were removed from a set of frames and replaced with newer lenses (no idea why I kept the old ones).  Those lenses were thrown out during the Great Purge of 2008.

I had three pairs of “reading glasses” that came with an eyesight improvement program I bought.  They had been in my car for a couple months along with some empty glasses cases.  The intent was to put them in a drop box next to the grocery store, to donate them to charity.  I finally did donate them last week (minor declutter victory).

By the way, I do have an opinion about these programs that claim you can improve your eyesight with exercise and relaxation techniques.  I was able to move my prescription from about -8.00 to -7.25 over 1.5 years, so there is some truth to the idea you can change the shape of your eye through natural therapy.  However, most of the eye’s structure is developed while a person is young and their body is growing.  So for an adult with very bad eyesight like myself there is a limit to how much improvement is possible.  Therefore I believe natural vision improvement therapy is most useful for children.

So I have all these old eye glasses.  These are kept for two reasons – they can potentially be used as spare glasses, plus they have a sentimental value from being a part of how I looked for the years I wore them.  There’s only six pair (instead of like 15 or so), because there was a period of time in my 20’s when I just wore contacts.  Also during the time I was down and out, when new glasses were needed I couldn’t afford them.  Only six of them now, but maybe they should be given to charity too.  I only wear the most recent pair.  Keeping one extra as a backup might make sense, although keeping spares isn’t very minimalist.

Medical lie leads to a truth

Listening to a radio talk show about health care today.  The host read about a study where there was a group of people who all had the same life-threatening disease.  There’s no current treatment for the disease.  Half of the group were told that there was nothing that could help their condition.  The other half were told that science was only 6 months away from an experimental cure.

The study was about how people react to having hope for a cure.  It turned out that the half that were without hope were happier!

They were forced to come to terms with the harsh reality that their days were numbered.  By letting go of hope for a possible cure, they saw each new day as precious, and valued a day as much as they used to value a year before they were ill.

Hope, like worry, can be a burden.  Both are expectations for an uncertain future.  It can be freeing to release it.