It's that little voice that says, when I pick up anything from an empty pill bottle to a cardboard box and get ready to dispose of it: You might want to hang on to that. It could be ...useful. It's not lying - especially when money is tight, it is easy to listen to that voice in the name of frugality and recycling. But there comes a time when I have to ask myself how often do I find myself needing an empty pill bottle? About once a year, maybe. How often do I end up with empty pill bottles? Four times a month, at a minimum, in an average month. Saving them is only going to cause storage overflow, not provide me with an excellent solution to a problem somewhere down the road. Multiply this by the amazing amount of consumer detritus that flows through modern life (newspaper! plastic bags - keep them out of the landfills by saving them for future use! ) and then my house is drowning in clutter, which makes me an entirely different kind of crazy, just adding bricks to the wall, or straws to the load, pick your metaphor.
There is a certain amount of counter-delight, fortunately, in actually getting rid of things, simply as a result of being told so often as a child that there was no money to be spent on me. I can let go of this item now; if I happen to need it or something like it later I can get another one. I can embrace my consumerist culture at least momentarily in an attempt to be mentally balanced, yes.
I'm really glad I don't have a basement, nevertheless.
