Monday, January 21, 2013

Enough Already



I love to save money. I hate to waste. I would rather reuse something than recycle it. I relate to the saying, “Use it up, Wear it out, Make it do, Do without.” But sometimes, I think I carry it too far. 

Case in point. I have a yellow clothes basket that has had a long life in my house. In the beginning, it worked well. Then it developed a split on the top rim. However, if I remembered to carry it carefully, I didn't get pinched and the split was only a minor problem. As time went on, that split lengthened and I had to handle the basket carefully so that it wouldn't tear any more. At this point the the fix-anything duct tape came out to repair it. That worked for a few months until the tape came off and left its sticky residue. In the meantime, the other side started splitting, and now it was easy to get pinched unless you were VERY careful how you handled the basket. Also, it developed tears on the sides below the top. I tried weaving a shoestring through it to hold it together, but that didn't work. I used the basket like this for a while until I got tired of being pinched by torn plastic.  

I've been thinking a lot about why I put up with that annoying basket for so long. In the beginning, it may have been about thriftiness, but that doesn't explain why I let it go as far as it did. Maybe it was from being raised by Depression Era parents or maybe it was from just plain simple inertia, but I think the basket represents a need for change in my life. I need to be proactive about changing the negative things in my life into positive ones. If I can do that, I think the quality of my life can change in a very positive way.

I'm going to start with simple things and hope I can build on those successes to then work on bigger issues. A few things that I can fix today are getting rid of the pinching clothes basket and the can opener that has never worked well. I can clean out the plastic-ware cabinet so I won't be annoyed by the containers that fall out every time I open it. I won't answer the phone if I don't want to talk and I'll turn off the news when they start talking about the same negative thing over and over. And the list goes on.

It all seems so simple. Why didn't I do it sooner?


6 comments:

  1. I suspect that there are a lot of laundry baskets in similar conditions, out there. My two daughters' hamper/basket is held together by duct tape. I think that I haven't replaced it simply because there have been more important things to tend to. It's on my list to replace, but so far down it never gets done.

    I've always wondered why we feel we "ought" to answer the phone or the door, even when it's simply not a good time. I think answering the door should be optional, and people, especially solicitors, should be fine with that. If only I had a butler, then he could tell people that I was indisposed at the moment.

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  2. I finally released a red laundry basket recently, after many months of finger-pinching and gingerly lifting it around the house. In my case, I hate throwing away stuff that can't be recycled, but it had to go! And strangely enough, this week I have left three can openers out so that I can work out which is the one or maybe two that don't work! Not so hard because I reckon they can go in the metal bin. I hadn't got as far as you in psychoanalysing my hoarding tendancies...goodness knows what my broken stuff represents...

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    1. I haven't figured out how to buy a good can opener. Over the years, I've found price and brand name don't necessarily matter. I finally have a good one in the kitchen drawer and the not so good one with our emergency supplies.

      Even now, as I'm learning how to let go of physical things that are annoying me, I still have to do a lot of justifying. I hope to get to the point that I can get rid of things because they are not right for me without a lot of angst. Life is to short to worry about things like that.

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  3. I can relate to this, I have an old laundry basket that stays outside for collecting weeds as I pull them in the field. It doesn't look as bad as yours but it does have a hole on the bottom now from my grandson using it on the concrete :-) I have to say I'd still find a new use for your laundry basket, so I think I am worse than you when it comes to using it up.

    I let calls go to voice mail when I don't want to stop to answer the phone and I quit watching news a while ago. I think removing those distractions will help us to live in the moment.

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    1. If I put weeds in this basket, it would still have all of the same issues. I put it into the laundry room to collect random clothes until they were ready for a load. I thought if it didn't travel around as much, it would be okay. However, it's still annoying. I think it's time to go.

      Back to pulling weeds. I use five gallon buckets that I have gotten for free from the local bakeries. They are strong and work well for a lot of things outdoors. I put holes in the bottom of some of them so they won't collect water when it rains. Your grandson may have done you a favor with the holes.

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  4. Oy! I too suffer from this syndrome. I did finally invest in a decent can opener a few years ago, and even though $20 sounds like a lot to pay for a hand operated can opener, having one that actually works is worth it's weight in gold! Of course, I couldn't bring myself to get rid of all the cheap can openers that don't work at all... they're all still in a box in the basement. Because, you know... there might come a time when I will have a desperate need for a non-functioning can opener!

    In terms of laundry baskets, my problem is that they tend to get used as storage boxes for this and that, and end up in the back of a closet somewhere never to be seen again. I do have a plastic hamper leftover from college - it was actually a freebie that some wealthy student left behind at the end of the school year, but it has served me well these 25 years.

    A few years ago a friend got me some fold-able mesh laundry baskets which work great, except that the cats love to play in them and they have these floppy nylon handles, and several times Jasper has gotten his head through one of the handles and panicked running through the house with a laundry basket around his neck! So I have to be religiously careful about putting them away where the cats can't reach them.

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What do you think?