Just in Case

 

     I recently came across an article on “13 Things to Throw Away Right Now,” and was struck by number two, titled “Just in case”. Possibly the most insidious phrase in our language, it is the major cause of our acquisition-driven, hoarding-based lifestyle.

In my previous home, our kitchen contained a drawer filled with plastic containers. Most of these had no lids. We kept them “just in case” the lids turned up. As if they were gleefully hiding just to annoy us.

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     During an earlier period in our lives, beset with the dual threats of natural disaster and domestic terrorism, my wife began collecting survival items with a passion. By the time her half-empty glass was full, our garage had amassed a gross of surgical masks, gallons of disinfectant, carboys of purified water, canned food to feed a small garrison, and enough candles to illuminate Canterbury Cathedral. “Just in case.”

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     Our first aid kits—in each bathroom and in each vehicle—were burdened with bandages, sterile dressings, salves, and ointments sufficient to resupply a small clinic, while our medicine cabinets and refrigerators impounded adequate medications (many expired) to treat most known diseases. “Just in case.”

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     How ought we assess the role of “just in case” items in our lives? The answer depends in part on circumstance: these take on greater significance if we are downsizing from an estate to a condo than if we are simply spring cleaning. When we compress our lives, we reduce our capacities. We redefine what is useful and what is not on the basis of what will fit.

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     But circumstances alone do not fully address the issue here. If we are not downsizing, and have an abundance of space, our reluctance to give up “just in case” things takes on subtler meanings, the psychology of which I am loath to tackle. This includes notions of relationships and proxies. Cluttered minds vs. cluttered spaces, for example; redefining the self by reducing litter.

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     In either case, the temptation to hoard is strong. I am reminded of an heir going through an attic of old shoe boxes containing fabric swatches, buttons, and other property of the deceased. She came across one containing random lengths of string, labeled “pieces too short to keep”.

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     When I downsized, I threw away or donated a lot of clothes—ugly sweaters, shoes I would never wear—but was reluctant to dispose of slightly too-small trousers, just in case I would someday lose my added weight. It was easy to get rid of kitchen supplies and spices I knew I would never use. It was tormenting to see many sterling silver bowls and gravy boats and wine goblets leave my possession. There would never be a “just in case” for these.

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     Having now been without this excess for more than a year, I have no regrets. A lot has changed, of course, well beyond my inventory of things. Only one of my “what ifs” came to pass. My smaller trousers now fit.

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     One luxury I kept for sentimental reasons: a sterling candelabra with white tapers, which I light at my evening meal. Canterbury, it’s not, but it’s mine.

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Ron Wetherington