material whirl

I began to know I have too much of everything when it occured to me that some of my possesions have possessions. I have a brush brush. That is, my brushes have a brush of their own, a brush for keeping the other brushes brushed. I began to wonder, when is it too much "stuff"?

The answer, of course, is that when your stuff owns you and not the other way around, it's too much. If you are spending all your time getting things, caring for things, then clearing out and making room for more things, you are over the line, stuff-wise.

For example, I have a 5-room house that contains 10 tables of various sizes and types, 7 chests of drawers, 3 couches, 13 chairs, 3 tall china cupboards (full of china and other stuff), nine bookshelf units containing at least 1,000 books, 2 televisions, 5 radios, 3 DVD players, a computer and an ipod.

At last count I had 52 sweaters (the vast majority red, my favorite color) 28 pairs of shoes, 12 coats. 30 bras (and I have just the regulation two boobs) 19 wallets, and 23 purses.

How did this happen? I, like many others I know, enjoy the "thrill" of something new. Retail therapy, I've heard it called. Feeling a little blue? Go shopping. Shell out hard-earned bucks for things you don't need and feel better - for a very short while.

Same logic applies to eating stuff that you don' t need and isn't good for you - feels real good for a minute or so. Then there's bloat, guilt and excess weight.

My life is bloated with possessions and I have begun to crave space more than anything.
Big purge coming - I will whittle it down to 10 wallets by summer, I promise.

This material quicksand is not just my own situation. Even little, little children I know have thousands of possessions. Toys so numerous they can't stay young long enough to play with all of them. One of my young friends had three battery-operated driveable vehicles before he was four years old. (He can drive them, too. He can back up and parallel park like a pro.)

So is that where we are in the world? You are what you have. Lotta stuff equals very successful? Here is where this all breaks down. I know lots of people who have an uncountable amount of stuff and they are not happy. What they already have hasn't made them happy and getting more doesn't ever seem to do the trick, either.

I will try to combat this obscene excess in my life. I will examine very carefully whether I truly need any new purchase. After unlearning the more,more, more consumer model I now practice, I will tackle the other issue of letting go of the stuff I already have.

This may be harder, since I am pretty attached a lot of my stuff.

For today, a blissfully beautiful summer day, I will try to just be. Just be here and living, without taking my emotional temperature constantly. Is this making me happy? Am I comfortable with this? All day, every day, I seem to view the world from my own little perch in Myopia. Minute to minute I am testing whether things are going my way. The world is a good place if it is being good for me. Life is in the dumper if I am made unhappy. No wonder I know so very little.

Wait. Wasn't I just reflecting? Judging instead of just letting it be? Rats! This is going to be hard!

I’ve got a beef with those folks who drive suburban commuters insane – the bunny-slipper mothers. Admit it, we’ve all been in this situation; you are running a little late for work, but there is still a chance you could marginally get there on time.

You are tooling along just a fraction over the speed limit when a yellow leviathan with flashing red lights ahead plunges your mood to doom. A school bus!! School buses don’t stop at the end of each street and pick up a group of little backpack laden, sleepy-eyed, sneaker clad kiddies as they did in my very distant youth.

Oh, noooo…. in these days of pedophile-paranoia, the bus stops at EVERY driveway. That, in itself, is frustrating enough, but I go completely around the bend and over the falls when the Mom at each driveway puts one slipper-clad foot on the bottom step of the bus, hefts her oversized latte mug to her lips and commences to kibbutz with the bus driver.

This woman is just shipping the major annoyances of her day off for seven and a half hours. She’s got the newspaper tucked under one arm and in her hand she’s got that steaming coffee and more waiting in the house, no doubt. This woman has the TIME to yuk it up with the bus driver.

I, on the other hand, do not. I have a full day of work ahead of me and I am already reciting my anti-stress mantra. I truly resent the complete lack of consideration the bunny slipper mothers have for those of us trying to get to work.

Can they not see ten cars of commuters lined up behind the bus? Can they not see the steam gushing out of our ears? Can they not hear the anguished moans and sometimes curses that would really be an education for the little ones? Maybe not. Maybe they have just forgotten what it means to HAVE to be at work at a specified time.

So here’s a little FYI for the bunny slipper mothers. We hate you. We hate that you get to shuffle back into the house and read the paper at your leisure, refilling the latte mug as often as you please. We hate that you are surrounded by quiet and can do whatever it is you do all day) when you are good and ready. You can let the phone ring and only answer if you want to when you have checked the caller id. You can flip through a magazine until it’s time for your manicure.

But most of all, we hate that you make us late because you don’t even notice all the cars with ticked-off drivers who are required by law to sit idling on both sides of the road while you and the bus driver catch up on the latest soccer gossip.

You were probably one of us BK (before kids) and you will probably be one of us again one day (those kids you send off each day to elementary school will be needing big cash for college before you know it).

So have a heart! Keep it brief. Load ‘em up and head ‘em out, so we can all get where we are going and should have been 10 minutes ago!

(And, yes, I am well aware that I should be leaving for work 20 minutes earlier than I do. And I will……someday soon.)

amour

same old, same old....

I just had the blinding thought that it would be great to be able to "refresh" myself instantly like my computer does. I love that little cyber-shiver the screen gives and wha-bam! new mail and a fresher take on the whole thing.

Yeah, that's what I need! A refreshed approach to my "quotidienne". As the holidays approach, I have desparately wanted to do something completely unlike all the other Christmas days I have spent, which are so steeped in tradition that, unless you look carefully to see that I am wearing a different red sweater in the photos, you would swear every Christmas picture was taken all on one day. Same food, same ornaments, same, same, same....

This year I dreamed of basking on a beach eating a cheeseburger and watching the sun set over the Keys. What am I doing? Looking for a new red sweater!

And it's not just the holidays. After a dozen years on my own, and twenty years in the same job, I often feel like a hamster on a wheel. I do it, I hate it, but I am so afraid that if I step off, I'll get splattered against the walls of my cage.

By the way, the cage is one I made myself. I know that. Its walls are made of fear. The ceiling is low-hanging lack of confidence.

I have made a million resolutions over the years, and broken all of them. This year I plan to amend my brother's standing resolution of "just do better" and give myself permission to do more, do it differently, and do everything better.

And yes, I do want fries with that cheeseburger.

beautiful danger

It is 6 a.m. and raining hard here in Mass. It is cold enough that all the trees and even the lawns are coated with ice. It looks like a crystal palace world, but there is a dangerous downside. Everywhere are branches and twigs, snapped off the trees by the enormous weight of the ice. Outside a few minutes ago with my dog, I listened to loud cracks as huge limbs tore away and then crashed to the ground. Inside now and cozy, in the early morning dark and calm, I can still hear those cracking sounds in the woods that fringe my yard. I hold my breath each time, hoping that a tree will not fall close enough to crush my little house.

Later, I will take my camera and try to capture the beauty of the crystalline world. That beauty can be made more intense when accompanied by a true sense of danger is a very interesting idea. Most of the time, danger is an abstract in the buttoned-down lives we live. It is experienced vicariously in novels or TV dramas. Most days I experience nothing more dangerous than the potential for a paper cut.

For now, I will continue listening to the insistent chatter of the icy rain and the low whirling howl of the wind, and to the sharp and tearing cracks of falling trees and heavy limbs. I'm safe and warm and dry, for now.