The Pun Also Rises(as seen in the North Adams Transcript)
"Less Is More"Today, I'm pleased to be able to share with you a shortcut to transient happiness. Ready? Here it is: Get lots of stuff, and then throw it away. Now I know this doesn't make a lot of sense, but we're human beings. We rarely make sense. (Flurble Wembledack.) Heck, the two things our society spends the most time researching are ways to make people live longer and die faster. Having ridiculously opposed goals is our specialty. Anyway, I'm not sure why we're so focused on getting stuff, but we definitely are. I think it's partially a reaction to the fact that we don't have a good way of keeping score. When playing soccer, or football, or 5-man squamish, whoever has the most points wins. Simple. (There are games where more points are bad, like golf or mortgage, but these are the exception.) But life doesn't come with such an obvious scoring system; we have to guess what's worth doing. And since our training comes from playing lots of games where acquiring points and stuff is how to win, we do the same thing in life. And I'm part of the problem. If someone tells me that there's free stuff being given away, my ears perk up. I can't help it. I love free stuff. Heck, most people get interested when they find out that stuff is on sale, which is similar to free but not as good. Tag sales. Yard sales. Soupy Sales. We can't wait to get a deal on old stuff someone else doesn't want. Meanwhile, we start noticing that we've become surrounded by old stuff. "I have too much stuff," you'll hear roughly everyone say. "I should really get rid of some of it." And while chores like feeding the lawn or mowing the cat may seem slightly productive, they pale in comparison to the great feeling of accomplishment you get from throwing things away. A man who has just done 6 loads of laundry looks haggard and tired. A man who has just thrown away 6 boxes of old stuff looks triumphant. Last weekend, for the first time in many, many, many moons, I cleaned my room and threw out some old stuff. I felt absolutely great. As I reflected on the volume of paper that I was discarding, I glowed with pride. There were, of course, some papers I could not bring myself to throw away. (The best of these were a few unearthed RSVP cards for weddings that had occurred in 2002 and 2003. I had neglected to send them in at the appropriate time. So, I decided better late than never, and mailed them out yesterday. I hope the brides' parents have a good sense of humor.) My point is, I found a lot of old useless stuff that was untouched since the first day I acquired it as new stuff. For example, last year someone had offered me a small purple plastic mirror. My brain instinctively reacted with, "Free stuff!", and instructed my mouth to say, "I'll take it." When I got it home, I immediately realized I had no use for this, and threw it in a box. One year later, cleaning my room, it falls in the category of "Useless stuff I should get rid of." So new stuff we want to acquire can become old stuff we want to throw away with nothing happening in between. Actually, I've recently discovered a great movement called Freecycle at www.freecycle.org. It's a giant bunch of people who tell each other what they're getting rid of, so other people who want it can take it instead of having it just be thrown away. There is currently a Berkshire County Freecycle email list which is very convenient both for getting free stuff and for getting rid of old stuff. Doing both at once may seem contradictory, but even God takes stuff with one hand and gives stuff away with the other. ____________________ Seth Brown is a local humor writer, and stuff. He appears frequently in the Washington Post's Style Invitational, infrequently in various other publications, and once in book form -- in his first book 'Think You're The Only One?' published by Barnes & Noble. His Web site is www.RisingPun.com
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