RHYS BOWEN: IN my early twenties I was working in BBC drama when I was invited to go to Australia to work for ABC. I leaped at the chance to do this. One of my fellow studio managers said, “You are so lucky to be going on such an adventure.”
I replied, “You could do it too.”
He shook his head. “Oh no. I couldn’t leave all my books. And I couldn’t bring them all with me.”
(On a side note, that was Brian Farnham who went on to direct All Creatures Great and Small, so was probably wise to have stayed put)
But it showed me how important possessions are to us. We like to be surrounded by THINGS. Our stuff. Some people collect useless objects: elephants or stuffed cats or spoons, just for the joy of collecting and owning. I confess to collecting paperweights. 
I have my collection of national dolls from childhood. I have photos everywhere. I suspect we all have much more than we need. I’m thinking about this now, in my twilight years. We don’t need a six bedroom house. My husband says we can never downsize as we have too much stuff. Hallie has just gone through the process of clearing out Jerry’s habit of collecting junk from garage sales. Our children say "don't you dare die and leave us with all this."
Yesterday I found myself thinking about this subject as we had guests coming to lunch. As I got out the normal china I thought “I should use the good set”. Then I thought “It’s only a lunch. We don’t want to be too fancy.” We have a set of Royal Doulton inherited from John’s parents, and we hardly ever use it. We have set a Dublin crystal in an ornate cabinet and we hardly ever use that. We have silver serving dishes and a silver tea set that we never use. How stupid, really. We should get joy out of these things every day, shouldn’t we? I suppose my generation was brought up to “save things for best”. I have definitely thought that way about clothes. Jackets hang in the closet for special occasions and writer’s conferences. Why don’t I use them to meet friends for coffee? Because that voice in my head whispers “saving them for best.”
And so I will go through life with a lot of lovely unused items that could have given me pleasure every day. I have suggested to John that we start using the China and crystal for everyday and he had a fit. It was his parents’ special China. They never used it and neither should we. I suppose it was the mind set of the times.
This is one of the reasons why I love spending time at our house in Arizona. When we bought it my one stipulation was that nothing comes from our California house. Everything has to be purpose bought and new. So we have the minimum to be comfortable. Enough furniture, enough dishes, enough clothes. But no collections of stuffed elephants. No sets of good china for special occasions. Perfect. Easy to keep clean and tidy. We do have art work on the walls that brings me joy. I do have enough clothes but none that I don’t wear.
I’d love to reduce the THINGS in our California house but how? Kids don’t want silver serving dishes or old fashioned vases or even my collection of national dolls. They like practical homes.
So how about you, Reds? Any suggestions? Are you surrounded by too many things?
LUCY BURDETTE: For sure, Rhys! We’ve been slowly trying to clean things out, but it’s hard to find the time and enthusiasm. I have used the good china and silver a few times this summer, but the glasses would have to be washed by hand. Hmmm, that stops me cold. But my main problem is books. The stacks grow and grow until I know I’ll never be able to read them all! But it’s very very hard to stop buying them because I love them so. I comfort myself by saying I could be collecting something much, much worse:). Oh, and ps, John mentioned to our visiting son this summer that we were attempting to get rid of unnecessary stuff. Next thing I know, I catch the two of them going through drawers of my stuff (kitchen things, really.) “Go start on your own drawers!” I said. And so they did…
JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Oh, so, so many things in my house. And my barn. And the two (falling down) outbuildings. It doesn’t help that my already-full home has now taken on everything in Virginia’s apartment while she’s studying in Den Haag.
I would love to de-clutter, but the problem is, what do I get rid of? I’m already good at donating books I don’t want to keep, which means the remaining 4,000 or so scattered between two floors and the attic are ones I do want to keep. Ditto for my four sets of fine china, all of which I use, and the special sets of glasses, like those engraved with equestrians in the 70s and etched with palm trees from the 30s. I have found an unexpected use for the 1960s’era Danish crystal double shot glasses: they’re perfect for the soju I serve on K-drama night!
Do I think my kids will want any of this? No. Except for Virginia, and if she winds up settling in Europe, I doubt she’s going to pay to ship the Chinese export Medallion Rose service for 14 across the Atlantic.
Maybe I should take a leaf from Rhys’s book, and get a brand-new, empty house where I can practice minimalism. #lifegoals
HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Oh, too much stuff. Yes. I am about to tackle ALL THE DRAWERS. I truly cannot wait. I am going to organize like mad, one drawer at a time, and toss the things that don’t belong with other things, and things that I thought I might need some day, and old pieces of gum, and outdated Advils, and yellow stickies with one page left, and ball points that don’t work. Then I am going to put all the things that DO belong together in little separate plastic bags, I estimate I will have a billion rubber bands. I truly cannot wait.
I’m making Jonathan do it, too, I told him I was going to dump his dresser drawers on the bed and force him to organize them.
I use all my good elegant china and lovely glasses all the time, Royal Doulton and Havilland and whatever else, and it is so much fun. SO silly to leave it packed away. Why? It is meant to be used, its destiny and purpose is to be used.
JENN McKINLAY: I am the outlier. I loathe STUFF. I keep nothing. Decluttering and throwing things away for other people could be my job, I love it so much. I have one copy of each of my books on a bookcase in the back of the house. No collections, no tchotchkes, and I’ve switched to an e-frame for my photos (it’s in the main room, has over 2K photos on it that it changes every 5 seconds - so much better than an album no one ever looks at) so I’m tossing my photos as well. The only “things” in our house are the Hub’s guitars, his extensive book collection (I don’t keep more than a few shelves of books and purge frequently), pets, and houseplants (okay, yes, that is my weakness - I do have a lot of plants). I also have good china that I use a few times per year but that’s it and when I cease hosting, I’ll be happy to unload that as well.
DEBORAH CROMBIE: Oh, stuff! I think accumulating stuff is fixed in our human DNA–well, excepting Jenn! I'll bet if we took a poll the majority of us would confess to too much of it.
I was going to say that Jenn's minimalist approach is what we all aspire to, but I've been contemplating this as I look around our house. Yes, there are too many books, a cabinet of DVDs we'll never watch, too many dishes, etc., etc. The conclusion I came to was that, while I'd like a few less books and all of the cabinets and drawers better organized, I actually LIKE the stuff. It is all full of connections, and our big old rambling house would look as soulless as those staged for sale by realtors without it. (No offense to my realtor daughter here–potential buyers want to imagine THEIR stuff in those rooms.) So don't sic Marie Kondo on me quite yet.
RHYS: So who is like Jenn and abhors stuff? And who like the rest of the Reds with too much stuff around them?
Nope, not tossing . . . there may be a lot of "stuff" around, but it's "stuff" that I like, "stuff" that means something special to me, so . . . .
ReplyDeleteGood for you Joan!
DeleteIf it gives you joy then that’s important
DeleteI also like my stuff, and I do use my mother's elegant china several times a year. One of my sisters and one of my sons are minimalists like Jenn, but the rest of us have the accumulator gene. At least my house is NOT a big drafty place with lots of storage room.
ReplyDelete(Here's a little story: yesterday an Afghan refugee family came to look at my little car, which I am selling to them at a pittance. The father and his American helper took it for a test drive. The mother and her three-year-old waited in the sunshine. She looked at the front of my modest antique three-bedroom house and asked if I lived alone. I said, no, with my husband. She said, "You have the whole place?" I suddenly felt guilty for having so much room for only two people.)
It is embarrassing to think how much more we have than most people Edith!
DeleteSo true, Edith! We have so much compared to much of the world
DeleteI once had a boy walk by my house on his way to the school at the end of the street. He stopped to pet my dog and looked past me and saw the pool slide in our backyard. He said, "You have a pool? Wow, you're rich." Perspective.
DeleteWe were just talking about this with younger family members this weekend!
ReplyDeleteTwo of my daughters, along with a son-in-law, tall grandson, and newly serious (?) beau, came for the biennial Halloween party Saturday. (Wild success, best yet, everyone said.)
The "kids"--the oldest will be 54 next month --helped with the outdoor decorations, plus moving stuff and reaching high places for me. As the Halloween Queen, I have acquired a good bit of "tat" over the years, including nearly a dozen skeletons, fake gravestones, flashing eyeballs, you get the drift.
I told them this might be my last party. It's a lot, and takes months of planning. And in two years I'll be 75, and no doubt creakier than I am now. They swore they would help, and then started fake arguing about who gets to inherit all the decorations. So funny. (To be fair, it doesn't take up as much space as you'd think. All the skeletons fit, folded, into a couple big tote bins.)
By the way, these five crazy people totally got into the spirit of dressing up, creating the most hilarious herd (we decided the collective noun should be a sparkle) of rainbow unicorns you could ever imagine. The boyfriend, an OR nurse, wore a black tutu, and my buttoned-up corporate lawyer SIL, who 20 years ago refused even to wear a hat to our party, spent the entire evening in a sparkly white, hooded-with-rainbow-horn onesie. I am still cracking up over it. My grandson wore the costume that started it all, an inflatable one similar to those wacky T-Rex ones, only with a huge spiral horn in rainbow colors, 7' tall.
All of which sparked the conversation about stuff. SIL'S parents both passed several years ago, leaving their only child to dispose of many family heirlooms. Most of it is meaningless to him and my daughter, as they are fans of minimalist and mostly monochromatic decor. So all those supposed treasures are still boxed or stacked up, and forgotten. They've moved twice without opening a box.
I once read that holding onto possessions has a monetary cost, an idea that really hit me. The Halloween stuff, our thousands of books, Steve's half million miles of film in canisters, and loads of other stuff, they cost us fairly precious space to keep, which is quite a luxury, especially compared with much of the rest of the world. We don't, as many must, rent storage space to keep anything. But two people in one good-sized house, yes, something to think about.
Karen, my brother rented storage units. He had stuff going back to the '60's including letters and cards from dozens of girls friends, receipts, you name it. But I found the receipts for the rental units and calculated that he could have owned a house for what it cost to rent those units for so many years! It was very disturbing.
DeleteIf we ever start renting storage units for stuff, please call the police! Karen, your party sounds amazing! I hope you have another...
DeleteThank you, Lucy. It was mad fun.
DeleteJudy, isn't that sad? There are people with multiple units, too, just filled with junk they don't even remember they own.
Stuff is worthwhile if it brings family together and gives joy, Karen! And we still have a 6 bedroom house for 2 of us
DeleteHappy Birthday, Karen!!! I do believe in keeping things that bring you joy :)
DeleteHappy birthday, Karen! And your party sounds amazing!!
DeleteWe just went through the great purge of 2024 for our move from Minnesota to Florida. We moved 3 UPack relocubes of stuff that is in storage while we wait for our house to be finished. (Each ReloCube® moving container has external dimensions of 6'3” x 7' x 8'4” (DWH), and internal dimensions of 5’ 10” x 6’ 10” x 7’ 9” (DWH). Cubes have 308 cubic feet of loading space, which is typically enough for the furniture and belongings from one room.) I am still suffering from remorse over some things we got rid of. We sold some stuff at a pittance and gave a lot of it away for nothing. The flatbed truck driver who delivered them said most people only use one cube. I know we are going to have to get rid of more once we get into the house.
ReplyDeleteWe moved from a 5 bedroom 3 bath 3 car garage with finished basement stuffed to the gills and will be in a 3 bedroom 2 bath 2 car garage home no basement.
We are getting along okay without our stuff in a furnished rental condo, but it doesn’t feel like home.
Cleaned out my parents home in 2018 after my mom died. Also a chore. Moving and dying seem to be the two best motivators for purging.
I look around my house and ask myself what really means something to me and what I could easily give away. There’s not much that is really precious to me
DeleteThere are serious hoarders on both sides of the family, and I know I inherited that gene. I have to fight it constantly.
ReplyDeleteIrwin took on our basement during the pandemic and got rid of tons of things we never would use again, like our skiis and our camping equipment. We also gave away books.
When we have to downsize, it will still be very difficult to do.
As for the good China that was my mother's, I do use it on occasion, but it must be hand washed so there is that, and her silver needs to be polished before use, so, that's a lot of work.
My niece will soon have her own home, and she will take some of my mother's collectibles. She likes antiques. My kids, not so much.
It’s the polishing and hand washing that puts me off getting out the good stuff, Judy!
DeleteRhys, don't you think sterling silver and cut crystal, along with wood furniture that needed to be rubbed with beeswax, were status symbols because they virtually required servants to keep them beautiful? Less wealthy people could still have the outward signs of prosperity, but had fewer resources for the maintenance, so they had to be used sparingly and with great care.
DeleteDishwashers have come a long way. I put the good wine glasses, good china, and my mom's sterling in the dishwasher and it's just fine. The sterling is kept in a "silver" drawer in the buffet so doesn't really need polishing.
DeleteI definitely have too much stuff. Though I recently did purge some books that I had from my parents.
ReplyDeleteGeorge Carlin said it best with his routine "A Place for My Stuff" - Here's the link to it (and you're welcome) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvgN5gCuLac
Thank you for the link Jay
DeleteDanielle
LOL. George is the best!
DeleteWhat do do as we get older and don’t need the “stuff” is a conversation my husband and I have been having for some time. We both retired this year and one of my plans for this winter is starting the purging of photos, and “things”. I have done a big books to the library over the summer (which has not stopped my from buying new ones) .
ReplyDeleteI find it hard to purge photos. Photos in frames and photo books are the things I’d keep
DeleteInteresting topic as it was a part of last night’s conversation. We decided to accept down-sizing family stuff donated to us if it could be used, and then using it. Great Aunt Esmerelda’s good china – certainly we will use it in ‘the cottage’, and we will wash it in the dishwasher. Same for crystal, same for china. Kids don’t want things – they have more than enough junk of their own – have you ever seen how many clothes they have and throw/give /away – garbage bags of kids clothes to the 2nd hand! I swear that their best bet when we check out, is to just have a fire and take the insurance – saves on sorting.
ReplyDeleteMy visiting cousin asked one morning if there was a glue to fix a pottery pot. I said throw it out. He said it was a family ‘hairloom’. I said let it die – all things must die. Get over it. Tough Love. Take a picture if you think you will look at the picture and have happy family memories – otherwise, say some nice words, and let it go. Nobody needs to have to dust a broken pot.
I know. I am not a nice person – just practical. The crab was crabby last night – I came back to the kitchen and made a scrambled egg before bed. The coffee is up, and the weather dropped real frost last night. Maybe I will have a cup in a lovely old mug and then clean up and get the bulbs in the garden for spring.
Oh yes, in reference to purging (always make me think of vomit), yesterday I “steam-cleaned” the fridge in the kitchen. The chickens were happy – now for the freezer. One thing at a time…
Margo good suggestion to take pictures of objects you won’t actually use but were heirlooms
DeleteThank you, thank you. I feel ever so much better. I am not the only person living with too much (we might neeeeeed it!!) stuff. This month has been an eye opener for me. Seeing the images mounds of ruined belongings left after Milton passed over -- it made me really look at my stuff. Late one night I began to count items in my bedroom and got way over 100 when I decided all of this has to go. My daughter and I will begin sorting. Stuff to donate to a friend who lost his house and all his belongings, stuff to the immigrant population that frequently land in Hillsborough County, stuff to just say out ya go, and then watch it leave.... and maybe if all goes well I can see the pattern in the carpets again. Let the good times roll!
ReplyDeleteI’m good at purging clothing, Coralee. My daughter made me this mantra years ago. One item in, two items go. It works
DeleteI'm good at purging clothing, too, Rhys. Twice a year, although I always fail at a few things I think I "might" wear again.
DeleteI'm very good at purging stuff in my kitchen and do so frequently. Sometimes it's just one drawer. Sometimes it just one cabinet but over a short period of time the de-cluttering pays off. Now I wish I could de-clutter other parts of the house. AND YES, we have a storage unit and it is mostly old furniture that realistically we'll never use. So that may be next summer's project. Ugh!
ReplyDeleteHA, moving into a 2-bedroom apartment have given me quadruple closet space and room to set up 22 bookcases packed full of books. But I did not inherit any family furniture, china or photos. My dad threw out EVERYTHING when he moved into a studio retirement room in 2016. When he passed away in 2021, I cleared out his room and only took important paperwork back with me since I was the executor of his estate.
ReplyDeleteFrom Celia: I have a reminder on my iPhone to continue clearing out. It appears occasionally!
ReplyDeleteMy daughter has been very clear, “I only want the silver Ma”. In fact she’s lucky because I didnt ask for china and glass as wedding presents as I was coming to the USA.
However even cleaning out a ton of stuff during our NY move to Maine we seem to have accumulated more and that is what I’m working on. I am accepting that giving can be easier than selling. Case in point. A hospital bed is now in residence. How to fit it in as we slept on a king Sleep Number bed and a bed from another room would need to be moved. Discussing this with a friend found her sister wanted a S# bed and there were family members who would remove it, move the new bed and were delighted to have our king. This successfully all happened over the course of an afternoon.
There’s still a hundred or so ‘collectible’ boxed plates in the box room which Victor fell for in the ‘80’s. I know no one wants them. Plus his basement workshop filled with thousands of tools, tiny pieces of metal called screws (well that is accurate when put together with me), nails, unneeded bits and pieces - total chaos.
A friend helped me do the clothes back in the summer. We did the freezers too and Julia’s goose went to another home to hopefully be cooked finally. So step or drawer by drawer, day by day and the load lightens.
Celia, tools can be quite valuable, particularly some older ones. When I was clearing Steve's parents' home, I got several inquiries and requests to be the first to see old tools. Alas, my FIL barely knew one end of the hammer from the other, so pickings were sparse.
DeleteAnything metal can be sold as scrap, along with electrical and electronic wires. I was surprised how valuable old charger lines are, but they contain copper and other pricey material. Metal scrappers pay by the pound.
Celia, my father owned a ship chandler, grocery and hardware store. It closed after close to 100 years in the late '80's. He reshelved all the screws, nails, other bits, poisons for gardening (Paris Green anyone), and fishing bits in the basement of the cottage. Things were occasionally removed from the screw-shelf. In 2003, we moved home from Ontario. The husband was a carpenter. We moved 3 - count them 3 truckloads of perfectly good stuff that might be needed to Cape Breton - need any glass blocks from a Nunnery? More spare usually rusty screws? They were stored on the screw-shelf in the basement of the cottage. In about 2019, the cottage was revamped to be a spare dining room, and the screw-shelf and basement were relocated. Now they are in my one shelf for gardening in the garage. There are lots of concrete blocks well used... He did spend a whole winter in the garage sorting screws. Not many were thrown away... Now you see why the kids should burn the place!
ReplyDeleteI downsized from a 4 bedroom 2 1/2 bath to a one bedroom 1 bath and after a small period of adjustment, found I really liked less. When I was evicted earlier this year, I took only what would fit in my car and lost everything else. So far, I haven't missed anything. I learned I can live in one room with a bath, bed and kitchenette just fine. I'm now living in my car and find that I can do that just fine as well. Full disclosure, part of the stuff in my car are books I couldn't part with and several personal items my parents purchased for me the year I was born which pretty much makes them antiques at this point! -- Victoria
ReplyDeleteI’m so awfully sorry you’re going through this. I hope you find a new place soon
DeleteThanks so much for your concern. It is an interesting journey filled with the most unexpected joyful and humbling moments. Always something new to learn, even living in the car. Very grateful to have a car to live in. It truly is the little things that matter so very much. -- Victoria
DeleteTen years ago I put half my books in the paper recycling bins, which made me feel great. I haven't yearned for a single one of those books, and now I buy 90% of my reading in the form of ebooks for my Kindle. Otherwise, Peter and I have very little clutter, in part because we live in a three-bedroom apartment with a tiny storage room in the basement and no attic. Our son will want NONE of our china, glasses, or furniture, but we're still using most of it ourselves, so that's all right. If a time comes when we have to move into a facility for the elderly, I guess we'll give or throw everything away that won't fit where we're going. It's going to be too bad but not a tragedy.
ReplyDeleteJenn and I are sisters from different mothers. I do have collections, cat and angel figurines, pens, some small items that mean something only to me, but if they disappeared tomorrow, I wouldn't lament. It's just stuff after all. I think the attitude comes from having survived floods and hurricanes and movers who didn't always deliver. I have always used the good china, silver, and glassware. It brings me joy to handle it and if I find I'm not using something -- it gets donated.
ReplyDeleteYou're my people, Kait!
DeleteI have stuff. When I moved a couple years ago, my brother in law and nephew swore every box they moved for me said either yarn or books. Some said both. Boxes were half filled with heavy items then yarn on top to keep it lighter for me after they left. I like my stuff, but I do have more than one person could possibly need. I'll need to start letting go of things but not today.
ReplyDeleteI finally have all my yarn and sewing stuff to daughter and granddaughter. If I want to knit again I’ll buy new
DeleteI have a friend who has excess yarn from many projects. She knits or crochets scarves and hats for impoverished folks. She gets rid of the yarn, enjoys the process of creating and those in need benefit. -- Victoria
DeleteI have done a few purges in the past and it felt SO GOOD. But now I'm back to being buried in clutter and stuff. My husband is a pack rat. "We might NEED that someday," he insists. I've tried boxing up the DVDs we don't watch with thoughts of donating to the library, but he freaks out. "I might watch that again!"
ReplyDeleteBut it's not just him. I have my own mountain range of stuff I can't part with.
Just like my husband, Annette! Glass jars, rubber bands… we might need them! Ugh
DeleteIf you don't mind ditching the DVD jackets, there are "notebooks" with plastic sleeves that store hundreds of DVDs in a much smaller space.
DeleteWe remodeled our house (4 bedroom, 2 bath) this Spring/Summer. That involved removing two big walls. Besides trying to fit my kitchen stuff into the new, smaller cabinets (and I am talking basic things like glasses, mugs, plates, nothing decorative), we are now minus two big walls for hanging pictures or anything. We are guilty of having storage units - yes, plural - because we still have stuff from my parents’ house and my in-laws’ place. We have been trying to be brutal and weed through it all. As has been stated above, my son doesn’t want our old stuff. (I was amazed when boxing up the stuff from where we’d been living that I had THREE boxes labeled “Pat’s bathroom”. I have so many duplicate things like little purse packs of tissues or toothbrushes!! Oy!) — Pat S
ReplyDeleteForgot to add that when we moved, we started using our wedding “china” — only 33 years after we got married! And my new best friend is Buy Nothing, a group on Facebook. You just post whatever you want to get rid of (can even be food you bought too much of!) and people respond saying they want it! There’s an audience for almost everything! Except furniture - that was hard to give away. Well, until a man who was helping us install something from Lowe’s noticed the stuff on my porch waiting to be picked up. He told me that if I ever want to get rid of stuff, he’ll come pick it up and take it to people in Mexico! Win win!! — Pat S
ReplyDeleteAgreed, our local Buy Nothing group has been really useful to give away unwanted items to someone who can use them. Clothes, kitchen stuff, food.
DeleteThis conversation is so timely! Over the last couple of years I’ve been very slowly working on getting rid of “stuff”. Over the summer I got more serious about it. I slowly made a pile of things to donate, including lots of books. (Don’t worry, Reds and friends, including Edith, I didn’t get rid of any of yours!) I had trouble picking up the bags of books and felt an ominous twinge in my back. At the place I donated everything to, a young employee came out to get the things out of my car. He had trouble picking up the books. I was sure a young man wouldn’t have a problem with it. My pain got worse and worse. I finally got myself to the doctor a few weeks later, and found out that I sprained my back. It’s still healing. I will NEVER let things pile up like that again!
ReplyDeleteAs far as other things are concerned I ask myself if I would replace it if my home burned down tomorrow. If I’m not interested in replacing it, out it goes.
You might think that my home is like Jenn’s now! Ha!! It doesn’t look like I’ve even put a dent into the clutter. I’m the only one who can see a difference. But it feels good to have even started on it. I doubt I’ll ever finish, but I’m working hard on not bringing more things into the house, unless they are necessities.
DebRo
Like Jenn and my Nana, I abhor stuff and throw away everything! It is also important to recycle stuff so things do not end up in landfills! However, I kept a collection of now out of print novels that i love and want to read again. I know that I will never find these books anywhere. Not even Apple books.
ReplyDelete