Is there anything more Southern than inheriting Grandmother’s Lenox china and fourteen place settings of Francis I silver? In my case, yes, since my family doesn’t really have such things, but the stereotype is there for a reason. We love our family heirlooms down here.
Or do we? There has been a spate of articles the past few years telling downsizing Baby Boomers their kids don’t want their stuff. And honestly, I think they are right. For the most part, anyway.
The American economy boomed after the GIs came home from World War II. The middle class grew by leaps and bounds, and a competitive accumulation of goods became the norm as everyone strove to keep up with the Joneses. People married earlier back then, and wedding gifts set young couples up to entertain in style. They bought nice things that they loved and cherished, and they bought things to last. Their Baby Boomer children followed suit in the accumulation game.
Today’s young adults, on the other hand, tend to be minimalists. I realize this is a gross generalization, but the trends point in that direction. These folks came of age during the Great Recession, so that’s not entirely surprising. Tastes have changed, as tastes do, and Millennials don’t have the same attachment to their stuff as their parents and grandparents seem to. They are the IKEA generation and to them their household goods are more temporary or disposable. This crowd also moves more often and has more opportunities to pare down their belongings.
I have no idea where Gen X falls on the continuum. If I were to guess, I’d say somewhere in the middle as we tend to do in all things. However, I’m married to a man who would sell all our worldly possessions on eBay if I would let him, so I’m probably not the person to ask about that one.
What that means is we have a glut of stuff. Some nonprofits, like Goodwill, report being overrun with furniture, and some have stopped accepting it altogether. It’s become a big business as companies step in to help people figure out what to do with their stuff as they downsize their homes. Kay Buysse, executive director of the National Association of Senior Move Managers explains, “For the first time in the history of the world, two generations are downsizing simultaneously. I have a 90-year-old parent who wants to give me stuff or, if she passes away, my siblings and I will have to clean up the house. And my siblings and I are 60 to 70 and we’re downsizing.”
So, what do we do with all this stuff? Well, that depends on how much stuff you have and how you feel about parting with it. There are lots of books out there to tell you how to do it. Marie Kondo had a best seller a few years ago with The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing that also segued into a tv show. I tried out the KonMari Method, and while I’m convinced Ms. Kondo is Stephen’s soul mate (see eBay comment above), it jumped the shark when she suggested throwing out your photographs. We still fold our t-shirts the Marie Kondo way, but the book did not “spark joy” for me.
One that did spark joy was The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning: How to Free Yourself and Your Family from a Lifetime of Clutter by Margareta Magnusson. The cheery book with the morbid title offers lots of helpful advice, gentle encouragement, and dry humor along the way. The basic concept of death cleaning is “you remove unnecessary things and make your home nice and orderly when you think the time is coming closer for you to leave the planet.” I wrote about this book a couple of years ago. It really struck a nerve and is still my most read piece on Medium. They even created an audio version of it.
In The Stories We Leave Behind, Laura H. Gilbert talks about a “legacy-based approach” to dealing with our stuff. It’s all about curating your own life and things to reflect the stories you want to leave behind. Like in the other books, Gilbert focuses on tidying up and not leaving a mess for loved ones to deal with.
We live in a time of unprecedented material wealth. For millennia the default human condition has been extreme poverty, but due to advancements in technology and broad access to goods and services, we can stuff our homes with stuff rather quickly to the point that our things become burdens weighing us down.
In my article on Swedish Death Cleaning, I talked about helping my sweet mother-in-law move from her four bedroom house into a two bedroom apartment. We did not do a good job helping her prep for the move, and on moving day she and I had to sort through all of her things and decide what to keep and what to give away while the movers were packing around us. As I wrote then, “It was a stressful, exhausting, emotional meat-grinder of a process, and by the end, we were both a mess—her because she didn’t want to part with her things, and me because I had to constantly nudge her to let them go. I felt mean, and she felt like she was giving her life away.”
I still feel anxious and sad when I think about that day, and it forever changed the way I look at my own stuff. Stephen and I did a massive purge of our house after we cleaned out hers, and I’ve emotionally disconnected from my things. It’s just stuff after all. I love the things I have—don’t get me wrong—but there are very few of them that it would break my heart to part from.
The mistake we made with Mom was not taking our time to sort through things and talk about the stories behind them, even the ones that didn’t make the cut to go to the new place. We had one day, so there was not time to talk about the trip she and Dad took to Barcelona where they found the cute figurine or talk about the lace table linens they found in Belgium. We found a treasure trove of maps and museum guided tour brochures, but there was no time for a trip down memory lane. Everything had to be sorted—going to the new house, going to family, going to charity, going to the dump.
Learn from us, dear reader. Whether you want to call it the KonMari Method, death cleaning, curating, or getting rid of crap, we all need to get a handle on our stuff. For those who are sentimental, that process may take a while as you sort through your things, reminisce about the memories attached to them, and decide whether to let them go. (You do need to let some of them go. That’s the point.) For the downsizing Boomer generation, remember your kids have accumulated a lot of stuff themselves and may not want your stuff. That needs to be OK.
To the younger generation, learn from us. You don’t need as much stuff as you think you do, and the less you accumulate now, the less you have to sort through later. Do periodic purges and give away the things you needed for a season but no longer need now. And for all of us, it’s good to remember to keep our feelings about our stuff in the proper perspective. After all, it’s just stuff.
Interesting Stuff From the Interwebs
#squadgoals
I’m certain the little guy was framed.
Online vs. In-person
It’s Not Over Until It’s Over: A Cautionary Tale
In case you haven’t heard, Governor Kemp announced that vaccines would be available to all Georgians starting TODAY! Please do not hesitate to reach out if you need help navigating the online vaccination appointment system. I’ll be glad to help you get signed up. Trees are blooming, my perennials are starting to poke their heads up in the flower beds, and it’s not quite the Yellow Season yet in Georgia. It’s the perfect time of year! May the rebirth and renewal of the spring season bring hope and joy to you and your family.
Until next time,
Karla
I'm convinced our Venn Diagrams are 85% the same. I, too, fold my t-shirts the Marie Kondo way and am in the process of a purge after 25 years in the same house.
One of our biggest challenges for ages is figuring out what to do with books we no longer want or need. With COVID, the public library wasn't taking them and typical thrift stores don't want them either. Well, imagine my delight when I discovered "The Book Nook"--a second-hand book store on Roswell Road. I've taken hundreds of books there where they have a chance of landing into the hands of people who want to read them. In return, I've got gobs of store credit and picked up several books as well. In addition to books, they have DVDs, CDs, vinyl, puzzles, and games. I use it now as a lightly capitalistic library. Highly recommend!! If you don't already know about it, I think you would like it.
Moving across the country forced us to deal with our stuff. We let go of a lot and I was shocked at how freeing it felt. Maybe I should write a book about across the country cleaning instead of “death” cleaning. Instead of Seinfeld’s “Sponge-worthy,” an item could be deemed “move-worthy!”