The Collector of Junk

I am the Wonderful Collector of Junk You Never Wanted. Being a bit of a packrat was handed down to me by my father, who has a garage and a large, two-story shed full of "junk", and that's when keeping it at bay with near-daily yardsales through spring and summer every single year. Obviously, I've got some strong habits to break this Cycle so that Caelan doesn't have to. We're trying to get things shaped up and ready so we can deal better when he is born.

I have a very large collection of movies, and its been the subject of "discussion" several times in the marriage, if you know what I mean by "discussion". Needing to get things organized and prepared for the baby, and my wife spending 90% of her TV time watching TLC's Clean House, has brought this subject back into the light. Of course, I rejected any thoughts of getting rid of my wonderous collection. Why, I have movies in there you could never find. I have both editions the classics Hercules and Hercules Unchained. I have Barbarella and Forbidden Planet. I even have movies so obscure, that I don't even want to watch them! Yeah, maybe I got a problem.

The thing is, I really like having the movies. Not the individual titles, and not to be able to watch them, which I admit I rarely do, but to have the collection as a whole, is a very nice thing, which I enjoy, for some reason. Rationality ate at my unnecessary ties to the collection and I may or may not have gotten overly mad at the idea of getting rid of them. I may or may not have thrown the first VHS I decided I never watched and never wanted to and never will watch into the box. Twice...

Packrats out there, we got a problem. Do what I did, and what I need to keep doing. Go through one group of things at a time, and really consider if you need each individual one. Try and cut it down by at least half, and later you can even cut that half down another 50%. Progress is the keyword here, and eventually that progress will lead you to something you never knew you needed: spacious tranquility.

I feel better looking at the shelf without two layers of tapes of DVDs on it and more stacked ontop of each row and on top of the whole shelf unit. Yick.