1December 2006

Down with overconsumption!

December 1 — you know what that means. Incessant Xmas music, the stores ramping up their sales pitches... Retailers are going to get more frantic than usual now that Walmart is projecting record-low sales this year. (Well, duh, everybody's shopping online except Walmart customers.)

Consume, consume, consume! Reminds me of that old Ray Bradbury tale of a futuristic society in which all citizens are required by law to buy and consume ad nauseum in order to balance out the industrial overproduction. Everybody was so fat they could hardly move. Sure starting to look like that's where America is headed. Me, I'm going against the tide by downsizing — physically, financially, everything. What do we need so much stuff for? My husband wants to buy a shed to store stuff in our postage-stamp-sized back yard... the stuff is currently taking up space in the basement, which we want to convert into a rec room. I'd rather get rid of everything that we don't need. I'm proud to say we have one of the few garages in America that is actually used only for storing our car. He doesn't know it yet but I'm going to stand firm against buying a storage shed. I mean, we could park in the driveway if we really need more storage (but he would never go for that). So this weekend I'm going to at least start to tackle sorting stuff to go to Goodwill.

Years ago I predicted that by now Americans would be embracing simplicity. Boy was I wrong. The trend appeared to be starting back in '95 or so but lost momentum...

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