The Stuffin' Season

Inspired by The New Rules Of Tidying Up, a lighthearted but pointed column in a recent WSJ, I came up with an even shorter list of categories for organizing your worldly goods than the ones the columnist suggested. Her list- 1) Things you can see without opening any closets or drawers. 2) Things you can see only by opening closets or drawers. 3) Things in your garage, outbuilding, shed, attic.

Now mine- just two categories. 1) Things you use and/or love. 2) Everything else. For the first category, find them good homes- appropriate places to live when you’re not using them. And keep them in good repair. And Category Two? Use it or lose it.

A lot of your stuff probably is not sparking joy. It’s not making your life better and if you want to haunt your children, leave it for them to “enjoy”. As the Category Two Pile mounts, so will guilt, embarrassment, and regret, which can lead to lots of lame excuses. They can be boiled down to one undeniable truth: Your house is being haunted by a bunch of unwelcomed “strangers”- the inanimate kind. Banish with abandon. Shove that unused, unloved stuff and enjoy some breathing room.

As for being ‘stuffed”… one of the weirdest seasonal foodstuffs (literally) has to be the turduken- a boneless chicken stuffed into a boneless duck stuffed into a boneless turkey. This might be an interesting kitchen caper, but it seems an unfortunate end for the chicken, the duck and the turkey. And while I’m on stuffing,,, where I come from, it’s called dressing. Thank the prim Victorians. I’ve been told that it’s stuffing if it’s cooked in the fowl and dressing if it’s cooked separately; we made no such distinction. It was all dressing. Stuffing was something in a pillow or what you were doing to yourself when you’d eaten abundantly. Not too many years ago, I learned that parts of the country with Dutch roots make filling.

So take your pick. Stuffed, dressed or filled- temporarily. Then back on the unstuffed wagon!

Happy Thanksgiving.

The Right Stuff

This quote, from clothier, Sid Mashburn, is the perfect explanation of the paradox of choice. I’ve stumbled around describing the paradox; Mashburn nailed (or pinned) it. My stab usually goes like this- having too many choices make us just as unhappy as having too few. But that fails to get to the heart of the matter- the right choices.

When the choices have been culled to only “right”, you really can’t go wrong.

A Comfortable Grind

The mortar and pestle- a seeming anachronism in the age of faster, easier, better. But add this to the growing list of paradoxes; faster and easier aren’t necessarily better. A electric spice grinder doesn’t hold a candle to my well- used mortar and pestle. Grinding spices by hand is a reminder that things being too easy might be worse than things being too hard. We get lazy. We demand “on demand”. And we miss the opportunity to appreciate that we are a capable machine and to remember that old-fashioned things are still in fashion.

I suppose if you’re running a restaurant and grinding pounds of coriander or cardamom, you might be forgiven for using an electric mill. But a tablespoon? The crack and crunch of the pestle in the bowl is music; the high-pitched whir of the electric mill is noise. The scent from the open bowl perfumes the kitchen without a trace of motorized harshness. Even the shiniest, most expensive electric grinder looks sad next to a stone mortar and pestle. I once had an electric grinder. It lived in a cabinet, seldom used- out of sight, out of mind. This marble one lives on the counter and is used almost every day. It’s a solid reminder of Victor Hugo’s belief that “The beautiful is as useful as the useful, perhaps more so.”

In praise of mortar and pestle was prompted by a recent NY Times story on culinary rituals. The writer’s great-grandmother was his family’s ritual-keep. She had “an aversion to gadgets”. She believed that “while a modern device can mimic an outcome, it can also erase age- old processes. Kneading dough, shaping dumplings and grinding grains and spices are all physical, even soothing.”

For a surprisingly comfortable grind, the mortar and pestle is optional, but strongly encouraged.

Admittedly Irrational

The pattern of threes is everywhere. Sometimes it portends good luck, sometimes not. This little tale is thrice told. I first read it in a newspaper column several weeks ago and since then, I’ve heard the same story from two others- both pleased to share what they thought was exclusively theirs.  Maybe the whole thing is an urban myth but myths are often instructive.

The protagonist is a female relative “of a certain age”.  She has either recently died, or her family, anticipating it won’t be long, is getting a jump on helping her clean out the stuff she’s squirreled away. The theme is rational v. irrational. And in this tale, irrational has triumphed. In the tidying up, a bag is found with the following label- “Pieces of string too small to use.”  The label didn’t lie. Frayed scraps measuring only inches fell out of the bag. If you’re looking for the poster child for irrational, consider it found.

With the first telling, I thought, “What a funny story about how quirky others are.” The second time around, I started to feel a little uneasy. And on the third telling, the adage that those who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones was hard to ignore.

So, I fished my snippets of yarn out of the bag where they’d been stashed for way too long. I hadn’t labeled them “too small to use”. They’d been saved with the misguided notion that I’d knit them into tiny mittens, hats and stockings to decorate a tiny Christmas tree.  I cannot over-emphasize misguided.  

There will be no tiny ornaments for a tiny tree. Someone might have actually used these bits, but that someone was not going to be me. The bits are gone. Saving pieces of string (whatever that “string” might be) too small to use, confirms irrationality.

The third telling was the charm. No more trying to rationalize the irrational.

Dash to Trash?

Right now, politicians, economists, business execs, and consumers are worried about stuff not dashing. Snarled, clogged, tangled, backlogged… you name it; stuff is stuck in containers that are stuck on ships. Even with round-the-clock scrambling, woeful predictions of a not-so-merry Christmas persist.

It’s a matter of mismatched supply and demand, compliments of voracious consumers, stoked by a pandemic. Too much money chasing too few goods. So to the highest bidders go the increasingly expensive spoils. Those willing to pay a premium will be first in line.

Consumers pushing back from the trough and tanking the economy is unlikely. We’ve been trained to consume. We’re addicted to more stuff- some of it needed but much of it not. I wonder if the delays in delivery will serve as an intermezzo- just whetting appetites for more stuff or if delays will serve as a consumption reset. “Guess what. I’m stuffed.”

And I wonder how much of the stuff that’s holed up in all those thousands of containers will be in a landfill or donation box in short order. That’s the dash to trash. One man’s trash is another man’s treasure. Possibly. But it’s probable that one man’s trash is another man’s trash.

So back to the Rules. Fewer things, better things. Buy the best and you only weep once. Needs and wants are not the same. “What if I waited?” It’s always a good question, but especially when the snarls have been untangled.

Trifles

A distinction without a difference… worth thinking about. We spend a lot of time getting whipped up about which color of white paint is perfect, or whether the chicken recipe with the sumac or the lemon zest is better, or which of the latest iPhones has superior features. Does it even matter? This isn’t to say distinctions can’t make a difference- just that many don’t.

Pay attention. Don’t fret endlessly over things that are trivial. Better to botch a bunch of bagatelles than to miss the mark on one really important thing. Remember Seneca’s warning about the Shortness of Life. Fretting over “fluff” is probably a regrettable decision.

I never read the word “bagatelle” without thinking of my mother-in-law. She’s the only person I’ve ever known who actually spoke this word, and for her, many of the things that could put others (moi?) into orbit, to her were simply bagatelles. And while I’m tripping down memory lane, here’s another trifle. The dessert kind. The layered English dessert- with sponge, custard, garishly colored jams etc. always seemed like a mistake to me. I grew up eating my grandmother’s Tipsy Cake. I think the Brits call it Tipsy Parson, but we called it Tipsy Cake. And tipsy it was! Lady fingers, boiled custard, slivered almonds, whipped cream and oh so much sherry. No nasty cooking sherry- the good stuff.

A whimsical word, a boozy dessert and fond memories… anything but trifling.

Irreplaceable You

I love Chanel. Not the clothes, or perfume or handbags. The woman. In her own words, “My life didn’t please me so I created my life.” I don’t think that Chanel was advocating gratuitous difference- a delusion that doesn’t fool self or anyone else. Figuring out who you want to be and then being that person is what I think she meant. Not following the herd. Not latching on to the latest trend. Forgetting FOMO and the ‘Joneses’. After all, the latest and greatest is seldom either.

The 1927 slogan, “Often imitated, never duplicated” is a good reminder that to be irreplaceable you have to be you. Counterfeiting a jacket or handbag is child’s play compared to the impossible task of pretending to being someone you aren’t. As Oscar Wilde, another style maven quipped, “Be yourself. Everyone else is already taken.” While Oscar and Coco had differing sartorial opinions (he, More is More; she, Less is More), they were hand and glove on how to be irreplaceable. Think, speak, and act for yourself. You, embraceable, irreplaceable you!

Overly Endowed...

Following up on the endowment effect, consider what happens when you’ve had a change of heart or come to your senses and realize that you’d like to be a bit (or a lot) less well-endowed. Moving often prompts a reassessment of our devotion to our stuff. When you’ve got to box and load it and then unload and unbox on the other end, even most inveterate packrats are likely to cut some stuff from their team.

This is the “coming to ones senses” time of the year in one college town. Sidewalks are littered with people’s castoffs. Stating the obvious, the pile of discards are often labeled “FREE”. The assortments could best be described as trash, minus the bag. Keeping an eye on the piles over a week, I can say with confidence that FREE isn’t getting the job done. (And this was one of the nicer looking accumulations.)

The endowment effect can be overpowered by the reality that what the mind knows, the eye will see. Even the packrat has a mind to know and eyes to see that trash is trash.

Well Endowed...

Tall, Grande, Venti? This isn’t about the size of the coffee bur rather the worth of the mug. An article on investing prompted me to take another look at the endowment effect. This is the well-documented phenomenon that the longer you own something, and the more you talk about it, the more devoted you are to it. Deciding you don’t really like, need or want “it” becomes increasingly difficult. It’s like severing a part of yourself. When the endowment effect (which seems to be our default setting) is at work, sensible and rational go out the window.

The mug experiment is simple, revelatory and has been replicated many times. Study subjects are sorted into three groups. The first group is offered a chance to buy the mug. The second group has a choice between getting the mug or an equivalent amount of cash. The third group is given a chance to sell the mug they’ve been given. The first two groups valued the mug similarly but the third group was exceedingly bullish on their windfall. They demanded more than twice as much to sell the mug they’d been given, as either of the other groups. Exact same mug. Wildly different assessment of worth. Endowment effect… take a bow.

“Messing up is easy. Admitting it is hard.” That was the headline that caught my attention. I know how powerful the endowment effect is with physical possessions so it shouldn’t have come as a surprise that the same is true with financial investments or relationships, or even jobs. We’re prone to doubling down on bad decisions because admitting that we’ve made a bad decision is hard. And the longer we bury our heads in the sand, the harder it becomes. We are loathe to cut anything from our team- even if it’s clearly a drag. It means admitting we made a boneheaded decision and no one likes to be a bonehead.

I’m siding with the behavioral economists with my Rule. Mistakes happen. Admit, learn and move on. If you can afford to correct your mistake, do so. If you have to live with it, at least don’t make the same one again. Maybe a Venti to celebrate a hard but important lesson learned!

What White? Good Question

I was cogitating on an essay about time- and how there really is no such thing as time management- it’s all self- management. I wasn’t getting very far and was feeling sort of antsy because it was taking longer than I thought it should. And voilà… a gimme from the WSJ! Cotton Balls, Snowfall or Static? Decision Seems Make-or-Break, a story about choosing paint.

The gist is our old friend, the Paradox of Choice. No choice makes us unhappy and so does too much. Hundreds, maybe thousands of different paint shades are too many. One decorator, frustrated by her client’s indecision responds, “This is paint. This is white paint. This is not cancer.” Paint companies have taken a play from vintners- way too many descriptions that most of us don’t understand. (I recall a wine tasting where the vintner thought a participant’s description fell short. “Citrus-y” seemed accurate and adequate. It was on the right track, the vintner admitted, but “Mandarin-y” was the ticket.)

Back to the paint. How about “white” or “off-white? That used to work, but no more. One paint company has winnowed it’s off-white options down to 152 of the “most requested off-whites”. Really, 152 is an edited list? It’s not helpful; it’s paralyzing. In a nutshell, that’s the Paradox of Choice.

So about the picture, I have no idea why I starred Hardwick White. It doesn’t even look like white but maybe when it’s time to paint, I’ll try harder to remember. But if I remember the finitude of my allotted time, maybe What White is not such a good question, but I feel sure that Nutshell would be a good name for something in the brown family.

Less is More?

Two years ago, the trend toward tiny was mocked. No longer, thanks to the lifestyle influencers celebrating a respite from Covid lockdown. “Life changing.” “An obsession.” “Essential”. “Hilariously dinky.” The bitty bags punch above their weight!

Less is more appeals to me. Except when it seems absurd. And at $195 a square inch for the baby Hermes, I’m calling absurd. Less is more… expensive. And friends, that really is a big deal.

Amuse or Distract?

I’ve called out shopping’s dark side; now it’s scrolling’s turn.

If shopping is Money in search of a distraction, scrolling is Life in search of a distraction. And that might be an even more costly and destructive distraction Left to your own device has been flipped on its head. It used to mean allowing someone to do what he or she wanted or was able to do without being controlled or helped. Left to your own device can now mean being the controlled rather than the controller.

What if living life with a phone glued to your hand or a laptop tethering you to your desk is more than a harmless diversion? What if we’ve ceded really living to simply being distracted? Maybe Alexa is not all that amusing. The things she does for you might be things you’d enjoy doing for yourself or things that don’t even need to be done. If being left to your own devices is not be all it’s cracked up to be, the remedy is at your fingertips. Simply bid Alexa and her comrades adieu. C’est la vie. Vivre votre vie!

Harder than it looks

“I kept wishing with real regret that I were capable of living in such continued simplicity. But I am not. Sometimes I honestly want to live in a plain room with a narrow bed, a chair, a table. But then I would need a bookcase. I would see a poster I must put on the wall. I would pick up a shell here, a bowl or vase there, another poster, enough books for two bookcases, a soft rug someone might give me--and where would the first plainness be? I cannot fight too hard against it, but I regret it.” M.F.K. Fisher

Like Fisher, being held captive by the flotsam of forsaken simplicity fills me with regret. Believing in simplicity is easy; living it isn’t, especially in an age and milieu of abundance. Some battles will be won and others conceded. Lest I get too down on myself. I remember the Rough Rider. No matter the outcome, to undertake a worthy cause is to dare greatly.

And so I soldier on. Join me. I could use some backup!

Pleased to Meet You!

Hello French market bag. The years have been kind to you. You still look as good as you did the day I got you, probably because all I do is look at you. Not that you couldn’t or wouldn’t work, it was just I never asked you to. I guess I really didn’t need a French market bag.

While on a walk, a friend and I popped into a new neighborhood mercantile. The shop was adorable- filled with lots of pretty things. There were woven baskets galore. I left the shop thinking, “I’ll come back tomorrow and get one.” Well, tomorrow became the day after and then two days after… In response to my friend asking if I’d gone back to get a straw bag, I answered “Not yet. I need to figure out which one I want.“ And then it struck me. Maybe I don’t want another one. What about the one I already have and don’t use? And to this my friend responded. “Maybe the whole point of shopping is to re-introduce us to what we already have.” What an insight. It might not be the whole point, but it’s not inconsequential.

To help stave off negative consequences, before you buy, ask yourself these questions posed by April Benson, Ph.D, a shopping addiction specialist and author of To Buy or Not To Buy: Why We Overshop and How to Stop. I asked and I answered.

Why am I here? (On a lark.)

How do I feel? (Glad that there is a non-chain store with a helpful shop keeper in my neighborhood.)

Do I need this? (No.)

What if I wait? (It will give me time to curb impulsivity and irrational enthusiasm.)

How will I pay for it? (The financial consequences would have been small, but a small frivolous purchase is still frivolous.)

Where will I put it? (In a closet or on a shelf- more curating the under-employed.)

So, hello again French market bag! Maybe we should get together more often.

Lesser of the Evils?

Sloth. Spoken slowly, it’s onomatopoeic. Dripping with laziness, indolence, or my favorite description- a habitual disinclination to exertion. Sloth’s a two-fer- one of the 7 Deadly Sins and the aptly- named aboreal mammal. Hanging around, usually upside down is how sloths spends most of their time. They move only under duress, and then at a pace that too sluggish for even a slug. A habitual disinclination to exertion seems generous, given that sloths often keep on hanging with furled toes, even when dead. I guess you could make the case, “Why bother unfurling now?”

This whimsical rendering of the animal got me thinking about the sinning version of sloth. It’s not the deadliest of the Seven but it is unique in that it’s the only sin of omission. We’re slothful not by what we have done, but by what we have left undone. We’ve become acculturated, socialized, even addicted to getting things done. Busy is a badge of honor. If you’re not busy, you’re on your way toward irrelevance. It will be interesting to see if any of the Covid- induced slow-downs, stick. I’m guessing they won’t. So here is a counterpoint to consider from Bertrand Russell, the English philosopher (and a slew of other equally impressive things).

“The time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time.”

The trick is knowing whether you’re enjoying your idleness or whether it’s driving you crazy. Can you say you did “not much”, without a bunch of guilty explanations? If so, it’s probably not wasted time. If you’re falling all over yourself to justify “not much” or heaven forbid, “nothing”, maybe it was wasted time. My favorite response to the question, “What are you going to do in retirement?” was from NPR’s Susan Stamberg. “Less”. Pensive, pithy… perfect.

Sloth- capital sin… or capital idea? It all depends.

Doubling Down on Doubtful?

Apologies for lowering my already low standards for blog pictures. They’re never suitable for framing, but this one is particularly noteworthy, and not in a good way. It was too big to scan so I resorted to cut and paste- literally. And much was cut. This was two full center pages in the NYTimes Sunday Styles section.

There was lots of white space with no other text. So at least they stuck to the notion that you have to eliminate the unnecessary so the that the necessary can speak. Their bar for “necessary” seems low and as I said on opening, I know about low bars.

Maybe money well spent or maybe money just spent. If the former, I’ll take a slice of humble pie to go along with that serving of crow.

Stylish?

"Fashion is what you're offered four times a year by designers. And style is what you choose." —Lauren Hutton

Thursday Styles in The NY Times asked the question… “Can This Jacket Save Gap? “ The jacket in question is born of Gap’s mashup with Kanye West.

I am not only hopelessly behind on celebrity matters, but delightedly behind. (I know Kanye and a Kardashian were briefly wed and that’s a gracious plenty.) “The jacket, which is made of recycled blue nylon looks sort of like a trash bag. Also a deflated balloon.” The story continues. “The jacket itself arrived like a puffer from another planet… It is unisex and oversize, with a squishy tactile look…It has no closures or additions, which may be interesting from a conceptual point of view but slightly problematic from a functional one.” And by the way, it costs $200. “To a certain extent, of course, it doesn’t matter if the jacket is flattering, or pragmatic. It is a first, and this is a historic collaboration from both a business and cultural perspective, so it will serve as a sort of artifact, or totem.” Hum. Roosevelt and Churchill and Watson and Crick might be twitching in their graves at this new bit of collaborative history.

I liked Gap, formerly known as the maker of American basics, back when they purveyed the basics- white t-shirts, Levi 501s, chinos and chambray shirts. When they went “off road”, I took the off-ramp. My strong reaction to the new “round jacket” is mere confirmation that no one will ever accuse me of being a fashionista or trend-setter. This jacket feels like the emperor having no clothes and maybe being glad of it. But if the Yeezy Gap jacket rescues Gap… serve up the crow! I’ll be first in line.

I’m getting in other people’s business and I’m not on that committee, but maybe Thursday Styles should be rebranded as Thursday Trends, Fraught Fashions or maybe the classic standby- caveat emptor.

The More Things Change...

When I flipped the calendar for the next quotidian quote… Friday, May 28, 2021

"Year by year the complexities of this spinning world grow more bewildering, and so each year we need all the more to seek peace and comfort in the joyful simplicities."  Woman's Home Companion, 1935

As I still bumble around on my iPhone, this quote reminded me of a little brochure from the 1930s that I found in some family memorabilia. Why my father saved this is a mystery, but I’m following suit. Helpful topics include: “How to Dial, Ringing or Busy Signal, How to Disconnect, Party Lines, Long Distance Calls, Information Calls, Repairs, Emergency Fire or Police Calls, and Assistance”. ( Mabel on Church Street, no outsourcing to Bangalore!)

The formal wording is charming. Here’s an excerpt.

  “The introduction of dial telephones in Rocky Mount provides the company’s patrons with the latest improvements in the art of telephony. The accuracy of service over the Dial Telephone depends upon the proper use of the instrument. Therefore, it is important that you understand the method of dialing a call. Because we are desirous that you obtain the very best quality of telephone service, we have issued this booklet which contains valuable instructions about the use of the dial telephone. If its use is not thoroughly understood after reading this booklet, you are urged to call at our Business Office where we shall be glad to give you a personal demonstration in the use of the dial and explain anything that may not be clear to you. “ J.T. Creech, Manager

Harried, stressed, overly busy, and complicated are not modern inventions despite our behaving as if the simplicity ship sailed on our watch. For every generation, tempering the wonders of the latest/greatest technology are the complications and busy-making.

We’d do well to remember the words of 19th century French writer, Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr, “Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.”  The more things change, the more they remain the same. (Well, probably not Assistance.)

robin's mess

She arrived on Mother’s Day which seemed fitting.

This robin was going to be some houseguest, and I’d have a front row seat to watch her build, lay, tend, and fledge. I imagined her parting tweet-“Mission accomplished! And thanks for the roof over our heads.” I taped over the lantern and ceiling fan switches to be certain she and her nest weren’t annoyed or destroyed by a careless human. I filled a water bowl so she’d have a bird bath nearby. Mealworms were coming… but she went.

I was a little concerned that her nest wasn’t coming together like I imagined it should, but hoped she might just have a more artistic bent than most birds. The bits hanging down looked so inspired. This Robin was feeling proud of this little robin’s originality. I remembered that Things Take Time. I was confident of her success. There were enough materials on the terrace to build a bird condo, but it just stayed a mess. Her first two industrious days turned into a disappointing week of her not showing up for work. She never built her nest; she just made a mess.

I’m not sure what happened. Maybe she found another place she liked better. Maybe she didn’t like being watched. Maybe she wanted a B & B and I should have gotten those mealworms right away. Robin wonders; robin knows.

And there went my story about building a perfect home with only found materials and a sharp little beak, but there’a still a story- maybe a better one. First things first. Cart behind the horse. Get the foundation right before you start on the embellishments. You might not need them after all. “ da Vinci knew, “Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.” The Renaissance “Birdman” could have taught this little robin about simplicity and she might have schooled him in flight. And if not da Vinci, maybe T.S. Eliot? “Success is relative… it’s what we can make of the mess we’ve made of things.”

Carry on!

545

The pool lane was always there to remind me that Things Take Time.

What began as a hope became a habit. Could I swim from Murphy to Manteo in a year? The prospect seemed daunting. I was tempted to calculate the mileage “as the robin flies” but, knew that this bird would be grounded; so “as the car drives” was to be the distance. When I started showing up at the pool twice a day, folks were curious. What in the world I was doing? The math doesn’t lie. It was going to take two 45 minute swim slots most days, otherwise, this would be no more successful than my sourdough bread baking or stab at French fluency. With a robust list of Age-of-Corona “fails”, I was all the more determined to make it to Manteo.

I’ve smelled the salt air for a few weeks, in recent days, getting close enough to taste it. And today I arrived. There were no balloons or confetti- just a nice sense of accomplishing a thing that took time. Some people say swimming is boring but I think it’s a great way to have a visit with yourself. It’s quiet. You don’t have to think about what’s next- it’s just one stroke after another. One lap becomes two. One mile becomes 545.

While I was responsible for swimming the miles, it was anything but a solitary effort. The pool staff made sure things were ship shape. My fellow swimmers were always encouraging. Friends and family asked for periodic updates- have you gotten to Rocky Mount? Are you past the Dismal Swamp? Sans Covid pandemic, I would never have hatched this cross-state swimming challenge. A watery, silver lining.

Today I was asked, “What’s next?”. I know exactly what I’m going to do. I’m headed north- to the Sanderling Hotel in Duck. It’s not that far away. I want to see the Audubon prints in the lobby and take the familiar walk to our old beach house in Corolla. Putting one foot in front of the other will be a good break from one arm in front of the other. And then I’m headed back to Charlotte. Cutting out Murphy lops about 125 miles off the trip- hooray! But still “When you sometimes grow weary of following the line , it’s well to remember that Things Take Time.”