Clutter

Dear You,

I'm in my basement "office" -- a space that includes my sewing machine and all the stuff that goes with it (including boxes of cloth), two bookshelves, and, at this season, a long table with yet-to-be-wrapped gifts. Around the corner are machines for washing and drying clothes, with shelves of cooking implements along the opposite wall and across from them many of the tools I've accumulated over the years. Essentially, it's wall-to-wall clutter down here, with paths for walking.

The problem is that other areas of this house are similarly cluttered. I have not yet ventured into the garage in this narrative, but you may imagine it. Nor will I even bother to describe the house in Florida, where I'm headed early next month. Long ago I knew it was easier to acquire than to dispose of . . . I just never dreamed how vast was that gulf.

In Russo's recent "Bridge of Sighs" the father sits in a car with the narrator, his son, parked across the street from a mansion just put on the market, one he will never be able to afford. He speculates whether anyone could live in such a house and NOT be happy. I paused there and thought of the line "Nature abhors a vacuum." A big house begs to be filled. If you have two houses, THEY beg to be filled. And I thought for the umpteenth time that the more stuff one has, the more it all detracts from a true pursuit of happiness.

It's not the stuff. It's never been the stuff. And it's a good time of the year to think about that.