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mg

to everything (turn, turn, turn), there is a season (turn, turn, turn)

by mg at 12:40 PM on April 19, 2005

Like many other women, when I get depressed I sometimes feel the need to buy things in the hope that will make me happy. Sometimes even the act of shopping is enough to brighten my mood, even if I don’t join in on the consumerism.

For the past week or so, however, I’ve had the overwhelming urge to get rids of things. There has been a constant, nagging feeling that I have too much stuff, and that I need to get rid of someone of it.

And I’m not sure what this all means.

Yesterday I was looking through my closet and thought, “That is entirely too many shirts.” I started to weed, but as I looked at each shirt and like Joaquin Phoenix in Gladiator decided whether to give it the thumbs up or thumbs down. And while I didn’t have 50,000 screaming Romans urging me to let that shirt live, I couldn’t drop the hammer and toss any of them.

And unlike with the hording urges, the purging urge hasn’t subsided from merely thinking about getting rid of stuff.

What is truly odd is that I don’t necessarily have a lot of stuff. Besides for the necessities like furniture, music, clothing, and all my old school assignments dating back to Junior High, I don’t have much. I don’t collect anything, and I hate clutter.

Yet, still this urge to purge persists. And yet still I can’t get rid of anything.

What should I get rid of to ease these pangs to purge? What would you?

comments (15)

I've had that same urge for the last year. For me, I think it was motivated from my last move. Nothing lets you know just how much shit you have like packing it up and moving. Now, I've added things like washer/drier, lawnmower and yard furniture. I don't want to move again.

Happy Spring Cleaning!

by MrBlank at April 19, 2005 1:44 PM


My wife is the hoarder and I am the wholesale thrower-away of stuff. If it doesn't have a place, it's gone. She saves phone numbers and adresses scribbled on the back of bill envelopes with the bills still in them. A source of much consterntation here.

by anna at April 19, 2005 6:09 PM


I hate MG.

by Pope Benedict XVI at April 19, 2005 11:58 PM


I think you should put all the stuff you would like to throw away into boxes, and store the boxes for a while, like a week, two months, etc. When the time is up, donate all the stuff you would still like to get rid of. Whatever you do, I hope it works out!

I'm glad to hear that there are guys who also get a kick out of shopping, although considering all the electronic gadgets some of my guy friends get, I should've known. :D

by jean at April 20, 2005 1:27 AM


Gals shop. Guys buy in bulk. At Christmas I measure success at the mall in gifts per minute. My wife can agonize over one purchase for days on end.

by anna at April 20, 2005 7:48 AM


My last move involved re-discovering things in boxes from my old apartment that I couldn't take with me to Hawaii. Had I been smarter I would've realised that anything that I didn't need for the previous two years I probably didn't need full stop. But now I'm moving to California, and the Mom & Dad Storage Company is out of business, so I have to throw lots and lots of precious crud away. How will I live without my busted Millenium Falcon, or my collection of GI Joe vehicles, or class notes from 1997? HOW?

by Adam at April 20, 2005 4:34 PM


to the end of time we may search, but it can never be atained. The ability one person can have to hold on to old junk like sherts is apolling. it you don't wear it don't keep it, regardless of the reason you wear or don't wear it.
no amount of shopping for somthiong new is going to solve any thing

by Rich at April 20, 2005 4:43 PM


Or help you

by Rich at April 20, 2005 4:44 PM


I hoard class notes, too. I'm planning on moving this fall, and I'm going to get my class notes digitized. They'll get scanned and saved to CD. Adam and MG, if you want your notes badly enough, maybe you could do this too?

by jean at April 21, 2005 3:56 AM


Put everything in a big bag like a garbage bag, then put it in the attic.

by Lockheed at April 22, 2005 5:00 PM


Good advice Lockheed, but make certain to double-bag the bodies, otherwise they get stinky in a hot attic.

by Joseph at April 27, 2005 10:24 AM


Eek!

by anna at April 28, 2005 7:50 AM


I'd been planning on digitizing all my old classnotes and such, but I never had a good scanner. Now I have one and I still haven't done it. Speaking of digitally hoarding stuff, I recently copied all my old floppy disks (with stuff dating back more than 10 years) onto my hard drive. Yet, still I haven't thrown out those floppy disks.

by mg at April 28, 2005 12:12 PM


Haha, I love it. You're after my own heart on this, MG. For my grad school apps, I submitted writing samples that were between 10 and 9 years old. I felt a little silly, but how often in professional life are you asked to pretend to be Max Weber and critique Marxism? Never.

by jean at April 30, 2005 12:21 AM


Oh yeah, for at least two, I had BOTH digital and hard copy available!

by jean at April 30, 2005 12:23 AM