Thursday, June 19, 2008

Priorities....

In a variation of desert island discs known fabulously to all music fans, Dave Bruno of San Diego is asking what would you live with if you could only have 100 possessions or the "100 Thing (sic) Challenge" as featured in Time Magazine

It's an interesting exercise to do mentally, if not physically. I personally have lots of stuff, much of it dumpster dived (their mostly books, isn't it odd that books were once the most precious of possessions and not mass production delegates them to the landfill. Words are priceless in so many meanings of the word these days). There is the physical need for things, clothing, shelters, sustenance, transportation, communications. And there is the emotional value of things as well, what is trapped in memory is recovered in stuff. Photo albums, wedding gifts, child's first bronzed shoes.

Things that I know on my list would be my laptop computer, my bicycle, clothes, my favorite pots and pans, toothbrush (would that really count as an item?), bed (could I sleep on the floor?). Do we live in a just in case world, a just in time world, a buy and throwaway world, a recycle and reuse world.

The limiting of stuff asks not about value but more about utilization. If you have a lot of things, but others are using your things. Does that count? Stuff translates into time, either giving it to your or taking it up. And while we can always get more stuff, we can never get more time.

2 Comments:

At 10:31 PM , Blogger ruchi said...

100 things? Man that's hard. I'll have to think on this and come up with my list.

 
At 4:49 AM , Blogger hmd said...

Wow. 100 starts whittling down quickly. Do pets count? My dog, my laptop, a couple outfits (shirts and shorts), my toothbrush, bed (yeah, I'm not a floor person either)... Books would be part of mine too. I don't have much over all. I moved into my husbands house with one trip in his jeep, but it's all stuff I love - old photos, a few little things I've picked up when I travelled. Memories, mostlly.

 

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