The books on your shelf

Recently we were given the opportunity to accept a pretty hefty increase to our rent or consider finding cheaper accommodation. Since we for about the past 13 years we've been paying about the cheapest rent in Darwin, we realized that finding anything suitably cheep would be far too difficult. We'd been holding our breath and crossing our fingers, hoping that our rent wouldn't go up for a couple of years as we watched house prices sky-rocketed in our area. But we knew crunch time was bound to come!

About 6 weeks ago the landlord contacted me and hit me with some news, which we'd been expecting but it still sent us into a brief state of shock, for a short time we were afraid we'd have no choice but to move out. We went through a little fear for our future security but when the various stages of grief had passed we were ready for the worst case scenario. After all this place does not belong to us, (nowhere really can) but we've been here for many years and call it home. We thought about the prospects of having to move all our stuff out and realized that in 13 years we had accumulated a whole lot of stuff. It's time we considered, what we would do if we had to leave? Where would we go, what would we bring?

As it happened we came to an agreement with our very generous landlord that we could just afford. Thankfully we can stay. Now we don't have to move out but there are renovations planned and we have to clear all our stuff out of the living area. It dawned on us that we have a lot of stuff to move! Amongst all our gear are two book cases full of most of what we have read over the past 13 years and a bunch of stuff I may never read! I'm a slow reader but in 13 years even I can accumulate a lot of books. Why do I think I need to keep them?

One big problem for me is the so-called acquisition of knowledge! I want to know stuff, I want to learn about the world, people and things, there is information in books. Most of the books can be dispensed with once I have read them... but for some reason I have kept them.

Lately I've managed to take some time to re-assess my priorities and consider how I have been approaching the business of life. What is my purpose etc... What am I clinging to? What do I really need? I know that I don't need many possessions but constantly find myself hording stuff. Building up a stock pile that could come in handy... but when? Bike parts, computer bits and pieces, and books mostly. I admit my life is cluttered with stuff. I remember a line from a Redgum song 'Where Ya Gonna Run To "...And the books on your shelf are a measure of all that you've earned..." Well I always thought the last word of that lyric was 'learned' but in the end both words add up to the same thing. Are my books only a manifestation of my own attachment to stuff, status, achievement? If I have learned something surely I can move on to the next lesson, why do I need to cling to the vessel? Am I ever going to read a novel a second time? It takes me so long to read them once! Do I keep these books as resources or trophies?

I dumped a bag full of books on Saturday... It's a start but I'm not ready to part with most of them. Maybe one day.

What is obsolete?

Eliminating what I don't need, despite the waste!

Way back in 1999 we bought our first computer. A Compaq Presario It was very exciting. I can't remember why we bought it, there was something about spreadsheets, word documents but mainly I think I thought it would be cool, and I could veg out and play video games. We wanted something that would retain it's usefulness for years to come. We were both working so could afford a decent machine and they weren't as cheep as they are now. It was a big investment and we fell for the hype that we just had to have one... I think back then we also bought a big TV too!

Looking back I can't believe how much we paid for our machine, but we were assured that this model would outlast most others in the market. Unlike the cheaper ones it had a DVD ROM (No burner... nobody had those!), and 2 USB ports which was also uncommon, but may prove to be handy in 'The Future' and a ZIP drive which was the mass storage hardware of the future. There was a whopping 15 Gig of space on the hard drive and it had 250 mb of RAM.

I have to say that the computer did actually change my life. At the time we got it I hadn't had any experience with typing. I used two fingers and looked at the keyboard, only staring at the screen to proof what I'd written! I was slow.

I was working as a Postie and had plenty of free time but I spent most of it playing games! Somewhere along the way I got up the nerve to leave my secure job and actually went back to school... At TAFE I learned to type and somehow found myself writing essays, reports and stuff like that. (Believe me it's not what I thought I'd be doing so long after having dropped out of school) The skills I learned using that computer enabled me to get office jobs. When I was a kid that was a big deal! I had dropped out of Tech, and never thought I'd work in an 'Office!'. I didn't really want to but that's not the point. (actually one teacher informed me that I would be unemployable)

(Now here I am dreaming about making earth bricks in a remote community...! anyway back to the computer story)

The old computer served us well for about 7 years, in that time we upgraded it with by installing more RAM, shoving in a new Hard Drive and installing a CD burner. After 7 years though it had become obsolete. It just couldn't be upgraded enough to run the programs we wanted to use, we were going to have to get a new one. This is when I realized just how wasteful we can be. PC's were designed to work like a kit. You play around with the components and build them up as you go. I thought many of the parts were meant to be interchangeable and so I expected that, I'd be able to pull out the motherboard and reinstall a new one into the box. After all it's just a box with ventilation, a power supply, and the necessary gaps and spaces for all the peripheral stuff you plug in. Well as you would guess that isn't how things work. There's a manufacturing principal called 'Planned Obsolescence' which pretty much guarantees that when they produce a new product the manufacturers make damn sure that it won't just fit into the space where your old one used to sit! A new product has to occupy it's very own space in the market and everything old must be thrown away! People must have the latest stuff! 

In the end we bought a whole new computer, even though most of the parts from the old one would have continued to work for at least a few more years! I have held onto the old machine for the past 4 years or so since we got the new one but now I've decided to get rid of it! It is such a shame. the box is still in perfect condition and it will likely end up in the land fill, not even used for scrap metal... 

I have been struggling to make sense of this sort of thing for a long time but have only now decided that it's OK that it makes no sense. Don't bother trying to understand why it's like that... it just is. Put it down to yet another crazy things people do, marvel at the colossal waste, but don't worry...  

It will all be obsolete some day. Rather than worry about it I think I'll sit under a tree and learn to tie knots in a rope. Its bound to come in handy some day, you never know when your ocky straps might snap... ;)