The House of Stuff and Things

This has been made into a vlog entry on my YouTube channel

I have a lot of shit in my house.  Actually, it’s stuff.  Because according to the late George Carlin, my shit is stuff and everybody else’s stuff is shit.

It’s amazing how much stuff we can acquire over a lifetime.  It’s amazing how many things we gather in life and think, “This is important and therefore I must hold onto it, forever.  I must place it in a box.  I must place that box somewhere in my life where I can find it and look at somewhere down the road.  That box will be in a corner of a room in my house where I will probably not go into and it will stay there for years.”

Why do we do that?  Why do gather so much stuff?

I still have various bits of my life as a wee thing, stuffed in a foot locker in my garage.  They are things from my childhood, my time at college in Myrtle Beach and Pittsburgh, and my life as a 23 year old bachelor.    And they are pretty much useless things but, I keep them around either because I’m too lazy to toss them out or because if I do toss them out, somehow I will forget my life.  The things that make me who I am will slip away and I will have no memory of someday back in 1987 or 1993 that somehow particularly meant something to me at the time when I collected that thing.

These memories, locked away in that foot locker, sit in the back of a garage underneath a bunch of stuff I’ve collected over the years of being a homeowner.  Somehow, at some point, I convinced myself that I needed each and every one of these things in that garage.  A hose, a nut, a bolt, a tie, a length of rope.  It’s more of a list of potential murder weapons from Clue than it is of any real use, and yet they sit there, gathering cobwebs, insect carcasses, and dust.  Each one of these things was put there because they served a purpose they were probably not intended to serve.   My hope was that they would serve a purpose, again, quantifying their existence in a place so full of stuff, it cannot hold a vehicle anymore.

In fact, in every room of my house there is something that is of no use.  Usually, it’s me when I’m standing in the room because I should get rid of these things that serve no purpose.   But, I’m working on that.  Recent changes in my life have allowed me the ability to start weeding through the things I don’t need… or really want, but I have just let sit in a box, on a shelf, behind a bag, in a corner, of a room, I hardly go into.   

At what point do we get like this?  At what juncture do we come to in our lives that we find ourselves needing to gather material items in mass quantity?  We’ve all seen these Facebook and YouTube posts of people living in tiny spaces and a majority of us say we could do that, but could we, really?  Where would all of our stuff go?  Where would we put the appliances that serve one purpose and no other?   That’s what I want to get away from, really, things that serve no purpose.  Now, you could say those memories in my foot locker serve a purpose.  They are a reminder of who I was or still am, in a sense.    And those things will stay.  But everything else in this house of stuff and things is up for grabs.

But when did it start to get this bad?  I remember for the first 10 years of my life, I shared a bedroom with my brother.  My family consisted of my parents and three kids in a three bedroom house.  Now, there’s seven years difference between my brother and me, so for a 16 year old to have to share a bedroom with a nine year old, well that’s pretty ridiculous, isn’t it.   In any case, all of my toys fit into a shelving area in the corner of the room, and for the most part of those 10 years, I barely spent any time in that room, except to sleep.  I mostly played outside or in the family room.  And I didn’t have much stuff those first ten years.   Most things were hand me downs from my siblings.  We didn’t have much stuff growing up, and maybe that was the best thing for us.

When my parents decided to upgrade the living quarters, and built a house nearby, I got my own room; and it terrified me.   I was so used to having someone with me at night that it was a scary thought to be in a room all by myself.  But, eventually, I got over it.   Actually, it was quite awesome.  I had my own stuff, now.  It was mine.  No worries about having to ask permission.  No fear that I may break something.   It was all mine.  My existence, my identity, summed up in a room of stuff and things.  So, my new room, that was all mine, accrued more stuff over the next eight years before I went off to college.

My parents’ biggest nightmare was not me going 600 miles away to college, but the idea that I’d have to have all my stuff with me when I went.  I needed all my things to make sure I remembered who I was, back home.   It was silly, I know, but it was me, my identity.    And, while I was at that school for four months, I accrued more stuff; mostly papers, and folders, and books, and a few clothes.  But then I came home and so did all my things.   At Pitt, I managed to keep only the essentials, because I was only an hour away.  All my stuff could stay in my room at home, because I was close enough to come home whenever I needed to.

It’s funny.  Most kids would never spend their entire college experience living in the dorms, but I liked it.   I lived in the same wedge shaped room for four and a half years.  I really only needed my room to sleep, study, entertain myself or another if I was so inclined.   I had a TV, a fridge, a computer, a microwave, and a phone.  I was set.  The rest of campus was my house.  I didn’t have to worry about roaches or overpriced rent or leaky plumbing or bad neighborhoods or utilities.   Why pay an exorbitant amount of money for sub-par housing in an apartment when I would only be in it a fraction of the time? 

Then I graduated, and my small collection of stuff and things, which had grown with more papers, clothes, mementos of college, and such, all came home and joined the rest of the things that made up me. 

Then, I moved out of my parents’ house and lived on my own.  With each residence; an apartment, a townhouse, back to my parents’ house; and then into a home, I managed to gather more things and stuff.  By the time I closed on a home, I had planned out all these new things I would need.   It was called a registry.   A wedding registry is like a license to check your brain and create a wish list of splurge.   Yep, when we get married, we ask other people to fill in the gaps of things and stuff that we want.  And that was probably the point, it got out of control.   A coffee bean grinder, a water filtration device, a set of knives, complete with a block and sharpener.   A lot of things that served one function and therefore, I had to double up on things to perform all the tasks I needed things to perform.  Then, as things got out more of control, I needed things to store my stuff, organized in a room I hardly ever go into.  Knickknacks, tchotchkes, baubles, all these things acquired over years of living on my own, just be displayed for 8 months out of the year, only to be replaced, for the remaining months by the same stuff, only holiday themed.   It’s madness.   Then, those things have to be stored as well.  Now, I have twice as much stuff stored in twice as many totes, in a room I hardly ever go into, and it’s only for display.   

When I got a full time job and ventured out on my own, I wanted a collection of movies I liked.   But that became a flawed concept because my VHS tapes suddenly became outdated, replaced by DVDs.   Then, after replacing most of my collection with DVDs, Blu-Ray came out.  Now, I’ve begun getting Blu-Rays and soon that format will be replaced by something else… probably digital.  Speaking of digital, I’ve amassed a few (like four) multiple terabyte drives for work stuff and things.  These take up less space, but they are vulnerable to being rendered useless if they tip over, apparently.   I’ve now become a digital hoarder, too.

It’s my fault, really.  I wanted these things.  I felt that having a house full of stuff was important.  While I sat in my apartment, which had five rooms, and a townhouse, that had seven rooms, I would daydream about when I would have a house big enough to prove some superficial point about myself making it to that level of materialism.   I would watch shows like Fantasy Open House, with host Claire Berger on HGTV.  (Not sure if it’s sad or hilarious that I remembered that show and host, by name, from over ten years ago.)  These huge homes in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, and Maui were listed for millions of dollars and I wanted to live there.  Hey, a bigger place for all my stuff.   Frankly, all my stuff would have probably fit in two rooms of these ridiculously sized homes, but I had plenty of room to get more stuff.  

But, now, I finally get it.   I recently had to tear down a pool that hardly worked or was ever used but I had to have it.  It’s a pain in the ass and I cringe at the thought that it will get stuffed into totes and stored somewhere for the next 10 to 15 years.   I have junk rooms that are filled with things I couldn’t care less about and it’s a panic attack of chest crushing magnitude to stand in the room and think, “Where do I even begin?” 

I know what I have to do and I know what I want.  I want to have only things that I either use on a regular basis or that can serve multiple functions.  No more quesadilla makers or coffee bean grinders.  I drink coffee regularly and yet it took me two years to see how pretentious and stupid I was for wanting such a thing.  Also, I have a Foreman grill which can make muffins or skillet items, as well as grills.  That serves three purposes and therefore is useful.   A six small wing capacity deep fryer that takes up counter space and is the size of an old CRT monitor for a computer is not.   I have other things that can accomplish that task.  

Now, I do want to get new things, or more accurately, things that are new to me that accomplish tasks.   I want things that I can enjoy and that serve a function.  I don’t need a lot of stuff.  A few tools that perform all the basics… not as seen on TV, enough dishes and silverware to handle my needs and maybe some folks who stop by, and just the bare essentials that qualify for performing all the tasks I need to do.  It would be nice to have a place to put all my shoes and shoes of guests when they come into my home.  It’d be nice to get those cubbies that you have in roller rinks or bowling alleys; something conversational, re-purposed, and cool.  I also need a place to hang coats, other than the backs of chairs, so why not take an old window, you know the kind with those cross bar things and turn it sideways, add some coat hooks, and then fashion the back to hold pictures. 

I recognize my house of stuff and things as a problem, now, ahead of my impending demise, hopefully many decades away, because I do not want to bequeath to my child the inevitable task of having to sort through my stuff.   My parents, now in their 70s, have a multitude of things in their house, things that are probably of good build and use, just packed in boxes, in the garage rafters.   I do not look forward to the day I will join my siblings in going through their stuff.   Not so much because of the task, but the reason.

Storage seems like such an insane concept.   If it’s not something you are going to use in the next year, why do you have it?  As you get older, that year metric should be reduced.  As you near the end of life, perhaps it’s a weekly thing.   By death, your house is no longer the house of stuff and things, but the house of you, the thing, which will one day be nothing.  And then, you, too, may be packed into something and stored somewhere, and hopefully people will go there to see you on a regular basis.

I've Got 99 Problems and A Fridge Is One

I hate my fridge. Let me say that again, I HATE MY FRIDGE. I shouldn’t complain, but I will and you will listen to my ranting, or at least go look at something else on the Internet until I'm done. The reason I shouldn’t complain is because the refrigerator came with the house. It’s an old Hotpoint fridge/ice box and it is, without a doubt, a design fail, in my opinion.  Here comes the airing of grievances. 

First off, the coolant piping runs along the ceiling of the fridge at an angle with about a four inch gap in between the left and right side set of pipes. These pipes slant upwards from the back of the top shelf. This means that in order to fit everything on that shelf you need to put the short stuff in the back and the tall stuff, like milk or juice, in the front. This prevents you from being able to see that jar of pickles in the back that is older than your kids. I am constantly opening or buying a new bottle of something because I didn’t know there was an already open one in the back of the fridge. Believe me, I went through three jars of strawberry jam before I figured this out.

Now, the fridge has managed to operate correctly the last six years I’ve lived in the house but last year it began having an identity crisis and will probably need replaced. What I’m saying is that the fridge thinks it’s the freezer. Early in 2009, I began to notice a small amount of ice on the pipes in the back of the fridge and then as time went on, the amount of ice grew until it enveloped all of the piping on the right hand side. I have only seen one other instance of this kind of ice growth. While my Mother-in-law was in UPMC’s Shadyside ER a couple of days, last year after being diagnosed with a brain tumor, I noticed one of those huge O2 tanks outside in the parking lot. One side of the tank was completely covered with ice that stood out almost half the diameter of the actual tank. The ice growth in my fridge was nearing those proportions. By September, I decided to get in there and try to fix the problem.

I grabbed one of the greatest inventions known to homeowners, a Scunci Steamer. My wife got this for Christmas, one year, and I’ve found more use for it than her. Truly, this is a wonderful thing and I highly recommend getting one. I’ve used it to clean paint off the hardwood floors in my daughter’s room. I should clarify that she did not do it, I did when I painted the room prior to her birth. Nail polish on the hardwood floor, comforter, dust ruffle, and herself was all her doing and unfortunately, I couldn’t use the steamer on her. I’ve also used it to clean the bathroom and it works great on blowing any mold out of the recessed joint between the bathtub and shower wraparound piece.

After waiting for water to boil, which is pretty much what I was doing, I got to work. I removed the contents of the fridge and began blasting the ice block with hot liquid magma, er… water vapor. The fridge threw a huge cloud of steam back at me as if I was putting Han Solo into carbon freeze. After an hour of clearing away ice and water I stood back and gave a “Hell yeah, fridge! You can suck it!” cry of accomplishment which had my wife doing a huge eye roll and muttering the word “dork” under her breath. I loaded everything back into the fridge and beat my chest in manliness. Then I burnt myself on the lid to the steamer and cried like a little girl.

The next day, I looked in on my fridge, prepared to gloat at my victory. But once again, there was a small layer of frost around the piping and a yellowed tint on the inside of the back wall behind the piping. I would have thought that the growth would have stopped there but it continued. Apparently, I had somehow developed a small leak in the pipe. This was going to continue to be a problem. I eventually just ignored it and dealt with having this issue. Once again, though, the ice block was removed, but not by my hands. Remember that little thing called Snowmageddon we had back in February? My power was off for two days over Super Bowl weekend and most of the ice melted away. Once the power came back on it came back with a vengeance, until this past weekend.
Because of the huge block of ice that had formed from February through August, I had less room in my fridge and things were being shoved into small places that should not have been. It was like one big booby trap ready to explode in my face and while reaching for something on the shelf I managed to push things around causing a can of pop to fall off the shelf. On its way to the floor it decided to pick up a hitchhiker in the form of the little button that controls the light. You know, the one that you push in with your finger so you can see what it’s like to be inside the fridge with the light out. Well, since it pulled the button clean off, the light would not turn off when I closed the door. I tried to fix it but was having no luck and just said, “’Eff it. The light stays on, now.” However, the next morning I noticed that the top shelf of the fridge was now wet. The light had begun to melt the ice. I had figured that I was going to have to eventually get back in there and clean it out but I didn’t realize I’d be doing it this weekend.
This shouldn’t be a problem because I have my Scunci steamer handy. It’s down in the laundry room, right? The red room? The back porch? Where the ‘Eff is it? Great, now I had to do this with a hair dryer. That takes forever.

I eventually got the ice removed and decided I might as well take care of the freezer while I was at it. I found a couple of wooly mammoths and the missing link when I defrosted it. I hadn’t defrosted it in probably two years and it managed to stay pretty well frozen during the power outage. Once again, I was lamenting the missing steamer which would have made short work of the glacier inside my icebox.

I’m thinking it may just be time to get rid of the fridge. Unfortunately, there are a lot of important factors to deal with in choosing a new one. The space is limited since the fridge is wedged into a hole between the kitchen wall and the stove. There is also limited space above it due to a set of cabinets attached to the bulkhead.  I don’t think there will be enough room for a side by side model because of the space and I have make sure I get one with the door opening to the right. The doorway to the kitchen sits right next to the fridge and it you open the fridge, you can’t enter the kitchen.  Not that any of use can get into the kitchen while you are in the fridge, but I’m thinking of my kid and my cats who might tear off down the hallway and try to make that turn, only to find themselves in Wylie Coyote mode, running into the door.

As for look, my wife wants stainless stell but I've been told they are a bitch to clean.  Black is also nice but will probably show off every little smudge, too.   Another thing to consider is that I am getting standing orders from my wife that we should by the fridge and the oven together to match the styles.   Um, come on Powerball.   Maybe I can hold off until Christmas to find one or both.  Hell, maybe I'll check the scratch and dent centers.   My only issue with those is beyond having a possible cosmetic defect, which doesn't bother me, I wonder if in getting that defect was the internal components of the fridge damaged.   I don't want to be standing there with a nice brand new fridge using a scunci steamer in three months because I wanted to save a few bucks.  I'm cheap but not that cheap.