Refuse the Refuse

When I told dad I was getting rid of a chair he’d given to me when I graduated from college, he got pretty agitated.  “Don’t get rid of that chair!  It’s comfortable!  We might need that someday!”  The chair is ugly, it’s not worth $10, and there’s absolutely no way mom would ever allow it into their house. 

I think they got the chair at a “garbage sale” - you might refer to them as garage sales, but that’s not what they are.  They’re the deferred disposal of garbage.  We all put things we don’t care about into garages, attics, and storage units which are really just giant trash cans.  (Tell me, how do we reach a point where we have so much stuff that we need to rent space on someone else’s property just to maintain ownership of it?)  Garbage sales happen when we finally realize that we’re never actually going to use any of this stuff.  So we put up signs and place ads to tell the world to come to our house some Saturday morning and pay us to remove our garbage.

Why do so many of us hang on to so much stuff?  I have a few theories.  First of all, we think we might need these things someday.  And we think when we need it we won’t be able to find anything like it.  Never mind that ours is a society of abundance and we don’t seem to be in any particular danger of running out of stuff anytime soon.  Spend ten minutes on Ebay for proof of this.

Even dad who has multiple houses full of furniture is concerned about a worthless chair because a house might burn down or mom might leave him or all other chairs ever made might suddenly become outrageously uncomfortable and there he’ll be without a decent place to sit.

We also attached sentimental value to things of no utilitarian value.  I hung onto an old broken stereo because it had been a “big” holiday gift when I was a young girl.  I stored out-of-style clothes because my mother made them.  I found books I’d never read, lamps I’d never use, and trinkets from people I forgot existed.   I was spending $600 annually to store items collectively worth a third of that. 

So I got rid of it all.  If I didn’t love it, gone.  If I hadn’t used it in 6 months, gone.  I felt a little guilty about pitching sentimentals like a bequeathed china set and stuffed animals given to me by grandma, but I crushed the guilt with logic.  I decided my memory (though decidedly shoddy) is more important than a trinket and my money is better spent on things I actually enjoy.

As for dad’s ridiculous chair, it turns out my sister wants it.  I think this makes him happy - being able to keep the garbage in the family so he can get his hands on it if aliens land on his back lawn, take all his chairs, and fly away giggling.