Wow – how apropos! Back in August our neighbor’s house burnt down. Everyone got out ok, and no one was hurt, but their house was mostly if not totally gone, and what was left was damaged either by smoke or water.
Watching that happen threw me into a strong fit of minimalism as I pondered the process of making the list of belongings the insurance company would request to pay on the claim.
It really, really makes you think about how much stuff one can accumulate that doesn’t really mean much. Things we keep for no reason other than we have it, and it seems worth keeping. And we put it back in the box where it has sat untouched for years and get on with our lives.
But I digress.
What would I do? Well, I would grieve. That’s what happens when you lose something important. You know – denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. That grieving.
Then I would recover and, slowly at first but then rapidly, start accumulating new possessions. Not because I would instantly need all of them, but because our society and our culture (I live in the USA) is built on the notion that we are consumers and we must consume. I expect that I would resist for a while – the love-lost-I’ll-never-love-again thing and all – but few people are strong enough to resist for long.
Now, if I happened to move to a different society and culture, then the outcome might well be different, but even then, relative to the people around me, I will be known as the guy with stuff. I like things.
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