Is this what one’s life amounts to in the end? A dear friend passed away 7 months ago and the process to clean out her house had been daunting on many levels. The range of emotions that I’ve gone through during the process is quite interesting when I look back on it, but then again I’m sure that it’s also the grieving process as well. I won’t deny that there has been so much anger while packing her things/belongings.
Seriously, what do your belongings become afterwards? Yes, we’ve had family and friends come in and go through her stuff to pick and choose what they may like. Some of it we did to keep as a reminder; other stuff we took because we may have liked it or thought that we could utilize it. As I’m writing, I’ve noticed that I’ve used the word ‘stuff’ – but that’s all it comes down to it – stuff! Stuff someone has accumulated and stuff someone else may want. Geez, almost sounds like we could go into a George Carlin routine here, but I digress.
So much has been gone through. Actually, every nook and cranny in this house. Now I’m here for the final packing and removal. Except for the furniture that’s left in the house, this is what’s left of her life - in the garage. I’m sorry, it appears to be a sad testament to one’s life, but I know the same will happen to mine at sometime in the future as well. And it’ll just be stuff that people will forage through to see what they may like and discard the rest.
You may wonder what is the point of this post? There really isn’t any, just basically my miscellaneous meanderings about our life or what happens afterwards. I apologize in advance if the tone here is somewhat somber, that is not my intention. But I guess when you speak of death, what else can it be?
We surround ourselves with things. And obviously I’m referring to inanimate objects. We are masters of conspicuous consumption. Buy, buy, buy!!! Probably the majority of what we buy is not because we actually need it. I’m not going to blame this on our societal changes. But, if you look back, you will notice that we changed our lifestyles greatly with the advent of available credit. First it was with credit cards; then came the HELOC’s (Home Equity Lines of Credit); and, then the easy mortgage. Unfortunately, I think this has led us to really become a debtors society, where the majority of people have more debt than they do assets.
What happened to living within our means? What the heck is the big deal with “keeping up with the Joneses?” Seriously, are they putting food on your table? So going into debt and buying conspicuously will allow you to supposedly attain a certain social class or socio-economic status? But do we actually stop and look at the cost of such? Again, do you seriously believe that trying to buy your way up the ladder, will actually get you there?
I had an acquaintance once who felt that he had an inalienable right to things. That he was deserving and had a dutiful right whether he attained the goods or that he was owed it by others. It didn’t matter if he could afford such.
Do you think that our present economic situation is due to this kind of mentality? If you think not, than you are only deluding yourself. I apologize if that appears terse, but we need to reevaluate ourselves and what we are doing. First off, it’s only fair to the children. What kind of legacy are we leaving them? They deserve the same fair rights and choices that we’ve had, but not if we leave them a major debt ridden society.
Things need to change. They should have changed years ago, but that’s over and done with. Tomorrow will be too late. It needs to be done NOW!!
Till next time – Marc It Sold!
I don't understand the pack rat syndrome. Stuff is fine, but order is better.
greast post Marc. I agree we tend to focus to much on stuff... in fact i used to be one of them. At the end of the day, however, our lives impact is really only measured by the lives we have touched. It was a huge paradigm shift for me!
Chris the implementer
We are definitely a nation of over-consumers. Most people just have too much "stuff." Hopefully they were able to sell some things via an estate sale or else donate it to a worthy cause.
I've bought several houses in the past few years that were completely full of other people's stuff. They didn't want to take it with them, so I let them leave the stuff as part of making the deal happen. After spending an hour or 2 digging through it for anything of value, everything else went straight to the dump. Kind of sad.
Lenn - I think I've fallen into the pack rat syndrome myself in the past, but I was always be taught about being orderly.
Chris - This is so very true! I've been there myself, but someone told me many, many years ago - if you haven't used it in 6+ months, then it's time to get rid of it.
Rob - We are not only a nation of too much stuff, but we waste too much also. As to the goods, I can't telll you how many phone calls I had to make to get someone to come over and pick everything up. Some only wanted some items, others wanted others. The Mustard Seed is actually coming Friday to take everything. Thank goodness.
Marc, I'm so sorry that you are still dealing with this! I remember when your friend passed and you told me that you would have to be the one to go through her things - that's a tortuous job for anyone to have to handle. God help whoever has to go through all of my "stuff".
Marc... first off, sorry for your loss. Secondly.... very interesting, yet so true. I don't really think about my "stuff" that I have collected or bought over the years. One main reason is because I think about life, having fun, and living life to the fullest... and not death. When the other happens... it will just happen.
Anyhoo.... you do make some good points. I guess I should return my 56" tv that I just bought and go back to the 32"? lol Seriously... some of the so-called stuff is to feel good... a natural high instead of a real fixed high.... just my .02.
Lisa - Thanks, but there is a light at the end of the tunnel. They're coming to pick up her 'stuff' on Friday & I have people heading over there to give me quotes to have some work done.
Jeff - Yes, but some just go overboard. There were boxes of seashells - one was 10 x 10. That's a lot of shells! And it's not like they were out and being displayed. They were in a box in the garage. That's excessive and a pack rat mentality.