I spent the last twenty four hours contemplating life minus all of the things I had packed in boxes to take back to NSW, due to the incompetence and lack of customer service from Grace Removals. It was scary and really stressful. While I was in panic mode, I made a mental list of the things that I couldn’t live without and most of the things were the basics, some others were clothes and shoes to compliment the suitcase I have, furniture and kitchen items. It was somewhat surprising to me that the list of things I felt I had to have was so short. I have always been the kind of person to value creature comfort but this exercise made me wonder if that is just a habit.
So that is today’s question, if you had to start again due to movers losing your things and you got to be deliberate about your acquisition of material possessions, what would you get and do you think you would end up with the same things as you have now?
Having helped Mum through this situation, this is something I have thought about before. When she landed on my doorstep after the fires, she had the clothes she was wearing and a few things that had been kept at my house. Her clothes were long pants, boots and long sleeved top, appropriate for fire-fighting but not for summer. The first two days were spent shopping for essential clothing, shoes and toiletries, and it wasn’t fun shopping either, it was rushed and quite emotional.
Later, when she started to buy stuff for a new house, some things she wanted to have again, others not as the original had sentimental meaning that a replacement could never have, so she preferred to leave them in the past. She found that her tastes had changed a bit, and also what was important to her.
As for me, I think I would buy differently to what I originally had, for much the same reasons, my tastes and lifestyle are different now to 10-20 years ago when I bought a lot of my stuff. Also I can afford better now, so I would buy much less stuff, but better quality.
The things I would miss most are those that cannot be replaced, like photos & letters, which is why we are scanning all our photos and slides.
In many ways we define ourselves by what we wear and what we display in our home, so it can be quite distressing to lose those things. I’m glad, Bec, that you will be reunited with your stuff, but what a hell of a way to find out which mean the most to you! Hope Grace have a way of making it up to you.
Having moved from one side of the planet to the other, I had the same thoughts while cleaning and packing.
There were a lot of things I didn’t want to simply get rid of, so they went into storage.
Some were sentimental in nature, some collectibles, some were just simply too useful to toss away. Then there were things that someone might be able to use but didn’t have space for right now, like my bedroom set. Others were things I had put too much money into, like my DVDs.
I brought lots of clothes because clothes are far more expensive over here and there was no telling when I’d have a job and be able to buy new clothes.
I have survived for days, once or thrice for weeks, with the clothes on my back and a (sometimes) irregular food-drop, so I know that’s all I absolutely need.
All the rest is just nice to have.
When the flood waters were rising in Brisbane, I went around the house to pack up anything that I thought was essential in the unlikely event that I would have to take off. Passport, household documents folder, wetpack, spare underwear and a change of clothes, waterproof bag with thumb drives containing all of my photos, food and a rug for the Furry Little Terrorist and two peices of inherited jewelry that mean a huge amount to me. I love my home, and most of the furniture is inherited, along with stories to go with it, but if I lost it all, I would still have the stories. I also knew that if I did have to take off, it would be to a family members’ house, so living essentials would already be there.
I won’t pretend that it wouldn’t be devastating to lose it all, but I also know that I don’t need it to get by.
The things that would matter the most to me would be all the photos (I have all my family’s albums as Mum didn’t want them in storage for 8 years!) and the books I have which are signed by the author. I can’t imagine how upsetting it would really be to be told all your stuff is gone, and maybe I would react very badly, but as I sit in the comfort of my living room, on my squishy couch with all my things around me, it’s easy to say that I wouldn’t be too stressed about having to start over. By which I mean, it would be very stressful to have to start again, but I’m not sure if I would be upset about many specific items.
I would definitely try and get the same couches again because they’re ridiculously comfortable
Actually I would be sad to lose DJ’s duchess. It was mine when I was a kid and I hope he can pass it on to his kids one day, too. It’s Silky Oak and my mum and dad bought it in terrible condition and restored it. If that was lost I would be very sad.
Important, agreed. If they are really important, copy them to DVDs and put them in the care of someone else. That way if disaster strikes and you can’t save your computer or disks at home, you have a backup. Doesn’t take much room, no strain for someone to do it for you.
Definitely. We have a back-up hard drive that Mr R keeps at work, we swap over regularly so that the copy at work is never more than a few weeks old.
Yes, I’ve definitely got to sort them all out. There is 6 or 7 albums here, including 3 baby books with all sorts of keepsakes. I do already back up the digital photos on my laptop, but I really need to get the old photos into digital form, too.
I moved to Sydney with a suitcase and carry on that contained a bucket load of clothes, a laptop, a recipe book and a photo. I know it seems silly, but i’ve lived without furniture several times since and have never had a problem with that. So long as i have a television, a microwave, a blanket, a photo of my family, mascara and a copy of ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ (oh – and a full wardrobe
) i’m pretty happy.
Poppit, you kill me. Don’t ever change.
Absolutely!
D and I actually did something similar as an experiment leading up to our last move, in our ever-deepening interest in living minimally (and moving interstate).
We were moving out of a three-bedroom townhouse into a three-bedroom house, so we were still going to have plenty of space. The problem was that we were going to start having inspections before we moved, and D and I are not the greatest housekeepers that ever were, yo. We figured having less crap about the house would enable us to keep it tidier.
In the end, our living space contained the couch, the coffee table, a short stack of drawers to hold essential clothing (one drawer each! we were goddamn champions!), TV, Apple TV and assorted modems, a mattress on the floor, and a side table to hold a lamp and my CPAP machine. Plus our assorted technology, since we work from home three days a week — an 11″ laptop each, plus the iDevices.
We kept our outdoor setting because there was no easy way to put it away, and it wasn’t going to bother anyone to have an outdoor setting on the patio. We kept the washer and dryer for the same reasons. But I cut us down to two dinner plates, two breakfast plates, four mugs (because we’re not ANIMALS), etc., took us down to minimal cooking equipment, minimal bathroom equipment. I also went through my entire book collection and dumped or donated everything that I was either never going to read, not likely to read again, or perfectly capable of buying in e-book format.
It was one of the most relaxing things we’ve ever done.
Improved our concentration heaps to not have a million things lying around that we *could* be doing, and only have things that contributed directly to whatever we were concentrating on that month. There’s still the internet, of course, but ultimately it was great.
To answer the actual question, though… all I really need is my data, methods of accessing it, my fiancé, and the cats. The only sentimental item I have in the house is the blanket my grandmother made me; I can’t think of another item I couldn’t do without or buy again.
*puts on IT hat*
And a backup of your data in a different location….
Yes. Without a backup somewhere else, disaster is guaranteed to strike. I can’t believe how many businesses only keep their data backup on the premises.
And, for those of us with Apple devices, it was conclusively proved last week that “It’s backed up to iCloud” is NOT sufficient. I’ll probably blog about that on my corporate blog next week.
You need an offline (USB hard disk or similar) copy, stored at someone else’s house in a different suburb.
Would you believe that my boss doesn’t see the problem with this?
See what I have to deal with? And this is one of the more intelligent situations!
Oh, I’d believe it.
You’re welcome to hire me to come up and tell them off, though.
Well, of course. Although I admit I am being bad and keeping the data I care about in iCloud, I’m also keeping it in Dropbox, and, through Dropbox, on a number of other machines.
If you have any suggestions about a less irritating way to back up data than to have a rotating backup system every time we visit Loller, I would love to hear them!
And of course, the number one issue… TEST YOUR BACKUPS. The number of times data has been ‘totally backed up for sure’ but no one has tested whether the backups work is truly painful to contemplate.
Although, really, the issue isn’t so much keeping things in iCloud as it is having your data out there for anyone to reset your password. I went around all my accounts as soon as I heard that story, just to make sure that none of them had anything more specific than a birth month, and all of them had different alpha-numeric-plus-symbols passwords.
(Which, dear websites, if you do not let me put symbols in my password, please GTFO.)
My backup solution is a 1TB external drive.
It’s about the size of a thick book and is an easy grab-it & go item.
I keep 1 with my computer and 1 off-site (when I’m actually working), and the only time they’re in the same spot is when I’m mirroring data once a month.
Yeah, I guess the long distance mirroring is what I’m after a solution for. I have a 1TB backup and a wireless backup at opposite ends of the house, and I could go between home and work backing up like that instead… but I’d really like it all to be automatic. XD
I kill 2 birds with 1 stone. I mirror my iTunes library on the drive so I can have my iTunes at work too.
And since there’s no unlimited bandwidth, I’d be wary of how much my backups used.
I’m building an automated one for my place, but they don’t come cheap.
Maybe have two hard disks, and swap them when you visit Loller?
When I moved in to a place with my brother, we both got pretty ruthless in what we kept and didn’t need. Between us we ended up tossing around a tonne of old furniture, junk that sat at the back of cupboards and the like. at the tip. We had, up to that point, taken after our father in being hoarders by nature. That exercise was a real eye opener and changed my behaviour patterns.
The challenge is distinguishing between things that you need, and things that you want. Even then, considering why you need or want them.
When I got my pay raise, a coworker said, ‘Think of all the new toys you can buy now!’
But that isn’t me any more. Which is why the raise went in to a plan to save a deposit for a mortgage instead.
My non-negotiables are a bed, a couch, a TV, and an internet connection for my computer. The last isn’t a true ‘need’ per se, but i terms of quality of life, it is nothing I am prepared to sacrifice.
The right approach I think. Especially if applied ruthlessly.
It is extremely liberating to get rid of “things”. But also very very easy to re-accumlate things. I came back to the country in March this year with minimal things (a bed, and clothes stored at my parents place and a the bag I’d been travelling with). It feels like since then I’ve been constantly accumulating things that I “need”.
Honestly I still don’t think I own that many things, but I have to be very careful about getting more.
Categories of things I find particularly seductive but try my best to avoid;
1. Innovative Storage Solutions (Looking at you Howard’s Storage World…) – peddling the promise that your life would be so much better and easier if you could just hang your shoes inside your wardrobe. The problem isn’t the creative arrangement of your things, it is too many things!
2. Kitchen Gadgets (it slices, dices, steams, grills). If kitchen gadgets were so amazing they’d be used in professional kitchen by professional chefs. Instead you end up with crappy plastic devices that do not deliver on the perfectly cooked egg and are always devilishly hard to clean.
3. Camping Gear – for an activity that is essentially sleeping outdoors and sitting in the dirt, the range of camping gear is mind boggling. Imagine how much better my next camping trip would be with “X”. And look it only weighs 100grams and folds down into a ball the size of a peanut.
4. Fitness Accessories – I run. Running is essentially a free activity. Base level you need shoes (not even with barefoot running) but oh no…it isn’t just shoes…I have a GPS tracking running watch, compression tights, running shorts, singlets, running hat. Then to support my habit and my aging body I have a fit ball, ITB roller, yoga mat, yoga stretching belt.
And don’t get me started on my Bunnings habit.
What categories of things do you find particularly seductive?
I’ve known female friends that couldn’t walk past a spotlight/pillow talk/myer without emerging with a throw rug or cushion. Another who has the best dressed dog in town. Or the soon to arrive baby that has EVERY SINGLE ITEM OF EVERYTHING ever made for babies…
I’m showing that to Mrs H.
+++ Unitaskers in the kitchen drive me mad. The grater and the can opener are about the only ones I can think of that I’m okay to keep around. Mum used to have all sorts of crap cluttering up her kitchen drawers — who, honestly, needs an egg-slash-avocado slice???
Oh man I have WAY too much crap in my kitchen.
But I DO use my egg and avocado slicer
If you use it, I have no objection. If, however, you buy things like banana-shaped banana storers that can only be used to store a freaking banana… and you use it once or twice a year… I have some bad news for you.
Umm, they are actually quite handy if you are camping and want to take bananas. They really have to be stored separately to survive the trip and anything but a banana shaped storage device takes up too much room.
PS Never, ever, put bananas in the kid’s or grandkid’s school backpacks unless they are in a bombproof container.
I confess, that is one use that never occurred to me, but I am not much of a camper. I’ve never had an issue with bananas or anything else properly sealed in a backpack, though. You want them in a separate container, yes, but idk if a banana-shaped one is necessary.
Every extra cc taken by the banana storage box is a bit less wine you can fit into the car. Sometimes in the outback it’s a long way between refills.
Kitchen gadgets are one of my weaknesss – we saw a ‘citrus reamer’ the other day at the supermarket, and after I finished giggling like a schoolgirl about it…I seriously considered buying one, even though I would only use it twice (if that).
:O Naughty gadget!
Guilty… I bought it a month ago. Used it once so far. Hard to clean.
But I wanted it… I am the ultimate collector of THINGS.
Kitchen stuff, yes. I <3 my knife set and mezzaluna aka "chop chop" (no joke, that's what it says on the box). TBH, I wouldn't buy stuff like an avocado slicer cos I don't think that's particularly useful, but OTOH, I'd like a microplane, despite the fact that there's a perfectly good fine grater that I could (and do) use instead.
I also have to steer clear of thongs/flip-flops. Don't get me started on how many pairs I own or have owned over the years…
It’s ironic that this post went up today.
I’m currently sitting in a coffee shop. In about 45 minutes I’ll cross the road to pick up a van that I’ve hired for today, and drive to the storage unit where all the goods that my ex & I stored before I went overseas, and start pulling out the stuff which is “mine” (ie – things unlikely to be in dispute that I still want.)
The list is, I think, going to be short. I packed it 6 months before I went to the U.K. and I was there for almost 2 years. Whilst I did grab a few essentials when I got back, everything in there is stuff I’ve lived happily without for the last 5 years. It, in every definition, comes under the heading of “stuff”.
I do want my tools, and some of the boxes of random IT cables and parts. My lecture notes from Uni are in there too, and of course my books and CDs.
Beyond that, I’ll look at everything on a case by case basis. None of my old clothes will fit anymore. I do love my DVD box sets, but They may be in the “disputed” pile, and it’s cheaper for me to replace them at today’s prices than argue over them.
That actually counts for most of the stuff in there. I think the Buddhists have it right – its better to travel light.
That’s an interesting question. We have done several clean-ups over the years, taking stuff to the tip or selling it. Each time, I find myself looking at several objects and wondering why on earth I didn’t dump them last time. I guess the things we consider important change over time. Or the people we don’t want to upset by dumping gifts drop out of our lives. And, as others have commented, tastes change and what is important changes.
Apart from the financial implications, furniture and clothes can be replaced. The only item of clothing I’d really hate to lose is a hand-knitted jumper Mrs H made for me. Photos are important. They are all digital now so it’s a matter of grabbing the laptop (a priority anyway) and the back-up drives. That also saves my music collection, which I’d hate to have to do again from scratch. I’d like to save all the DVDs as well, but that would be tricky in a rush evacuation situation as there are boxes of them. Money permitting, most of them can be replaced. And my e-reader and books. Again, in an emergency the books would simply be an impossibility but at some stage in the future most of my books will be on the lovely, pocket-sized e-reader.
I suspect that if I sat down and wrote a list it would contain things I don’t really need. I haven’t been through fire or flood situations but I suspect it really sharpens your critical faculties when it comes to what is or isn’t important.
Oh, yeah, I’d take Mrs H too.
Poor Mrs H at the bottom of the list
On a serious and related, I get VERY worked up thinking about how I would get all my animals to safety in the event of a fire. I think I would just need to let the cats outside and pray they came home again.
My dogs are a worry. They have already proven they can’t find their way home. It’s a good thing they are chipped.
As much as I love stuff, and I do (I think I’ve mentioned before that one of my groups of friends calls me the Merchandise Queen), I honestly don’t think there’s anything I could not do without. Of course I would be devastated if I lost it all and I have some amazing stuff (like a lightsaber signed by Mark Hamill and some things that have very great sentimental value) but really it’s just stuff. The zillion books are just stuff (even the ones that are signed by the author). My clothes are just stuff. My computer is just stuff (and yes, I do back it up and keep the back-up remotely) and even if I lost everything on it, every photo, every memory, it’s just stuff. Even my half-made wedding dress is just stuff. It would be very very difficult to start again but, as long as I was alive, I would be able to do it.
People are much more important than stuff in my opinion. As long as I still had my family, my Ghryswald and my friends, I’d get through it.
That nails it – that is *it* in a nutshell, and whilst we’ve all been thinking about stuff that is important to us, I think we’d all agree that it is our loved ones (furred & feathered as well as people) that matter most.
Yes, they are the truly important things. Stuff can be replaced, and life can be fine without stuff.
In the event of an emergency, the only things I will grab will be my grandmother’s engagement ring and my purse.
Everything else is either insured, able to be replaced, or unnecessary. There are things in my home that have a story attached to them, but the story remains whether I have the ‘thing’ in my possession to remind me or not.
As long as no one is injured or hurt, the rest is fix-able.
If I had a leisurely choice to deliberately start again though, it would be different. My ‘needs’ would be greater, although not necessarily better. I think my list would expand to include a couple of my grandmother’s photo albums that I inherited, my recipe books and handwritten recipe notes, and my jewellery box.
Apart from the obvious like Mrs P and the rest of my dynasty (fuzzy members included) I guess my 2TB backup drive (which has been sitting on the premesis since I last backed up a few months ago – oops – job to do tonight), maybe some stuff in the top drawer of the filing cabinet, there’s not a lot I really need. DVD folders, Kindle, phone etc are great ways to be able to grab a huge chunk of our collections in one armload.
I would have to grab my little Wall-E plastic toy from my bedside table. LML loves grabbing it and making “Ruum ruum ruum” noises as she drives him around. Wall-E rocks.
That and the bacon in the fridge.
Oh and I think I’d try to suppress a fire with Mrs P’s decorative cushions.
Women and cushions hey? Ridiculous. I know there is a bed/couch under there somewhere…
When I was pregnant my cushions stopped being decorative. DJ was upside down and I was told all these magical ways to sit to try and encourage him to turn. Plus it was damn uncomfortable. I took to sitting with three (that’s right, count ‘em: three) cushions wedged behind me when sitting on the couch. Even now I sit with one in the small of my back.
Decorative cushions are amazing… Stop being such boys. Shush!
No objection to them IF you’re allowed to use them as cushions. When their sole purpose is removed they’re just a lump of colour taking up my arse groove. The only soft immobile things that occasionally get priority of the couch over me are the dogs.
But then they might get ruined………..
I would only be disappointed losing photographs. That would be the most painful, everything else is replaceable.
I can pack my life up into a couple of suitcases and boxes. I honestly wouldn’t care if I lost anything else, I don’t have anything of much value.
I had a mate who had all his photos electronically stored in a portable hard drive.
One day, he dropped it and the computer wouldn’t read it any more. He was wearing his brown pants because it included many photos of kids growing up that were the only copies.
He was also a bit scared about taking it to an IT place to see if the data could be recovered due to the adult videos he also had stored on there.
Eventually, all photos were recovered. But I did enjoy his self manufactured moment of stress a bit more than I should have.
Standing in my room this afternoon, looking around at everything in it, I have to admit that I would only be disappointed if I lost my photos (hard copies in albums & stored on a USB stick + the negatives from older ones that ought to be converted at some stage), my CD collection (although it can be largely replaced, I do have a few signed ones in there + a couple of others that I wouldn’t bother buying online if I lost them), my current diary + my old ones (sentimental value?) & this hand puppet I have from my childhood. Aside from the family, that’s it. Everything else is replaceable or something I wouldn’t miss terribly methinks.
I do remember packing up my suitcase full of stuff when there was a possible bushfire threat near me once. Luckily it never eventuated, but I remember packing clothes, photo albums, maybe shoes & a few other things, but that was it.