The story of a fridge

Once there was a little girl who, unfortunately, was born with the Pack-Rat gene. This gene ran in both sides of her family so her urge to keep things overpowered logic. At age 6 or 7, the little girl was horrified to hear that the family's ugly pea green refrigerator broke down, and the little girl's parents had purchased another fridge. The little girl was distraught! How could they just get rid of the fridge after it kept the family's food cool for years? What would the house be like without that fridge? How would her life change by not seeing the green fridge every day? Her eyes welled up with tears. The mom and dad, both afflicted by the same gene, sighed and put the fridge in the carport where it became "storage" for newspapers. Being "green" before the term existed, the family did recycle many newspapers, but they decided it was handy to have an entire fridge full of newspapers for whatever art or craft project may require it. The little girl learned to keep things "just in case" you need them later. The little girl continued to hold onto objects: at her insistence the old living room chair went into the dog's yard where it fell apart in the weather, the cloth on her pillow became transparent it was so used, dozens of stuffed animals lined her bed wearing her old t-shirts she wouldn't give up and ultimately became large dust bunnies under the bed.

Then one day about 10 years after the fridge incident, the little girl and her family moved across country. She remembered to glance one last time at the pea green fridge, which was now quite the joke in the family. At her new home she cried for days, partly out of fear of her new place, but also the idea of her friends doing things without her, another family living in her house and the places she loved changing. Then the first day of school she realized no one remembered her from the 3rd grade as a freckle faced buck tooth girl that talked too much, or the 6th grader that couldn't keep a friend's secret if her life depended on it, or the 9th grader who had a crush on every boy in her entire english class. She could be whoever she wanted! Well, it turns out, that the very first day of school she met her future husband, even if he wasn't very nice to her that particular day. First lesson: maybe change was good.

Over the years the little girl, now a young adult, became addicted to change and loved moving to new places, switching colleges, meeting people who never knew her. Each time she moved she took less with her and left more at her mom and dads, until the last move to NY everything she wanted fit in a small car. She realized all those things were a pain at this point in her life; although she did leave quite a few boxes of sentimental things. Second Lesson: Things can hold you back.

A few years after their wedding the young couple decided to move again and they rented a small U-haul. The little girl spent a day boxing up all the books and high school/college trinkets that took over their bedroom. The books lined the walls and were even in storage containers under the bed. In the end she gave away over 100 books she knew she'd never read again and lots of sentimental items. All the clutter of dusty trinkets, playbills, and mix tapes annoyed her. The silly little broken Furby that her husband gave her in high school really had no place in their lives. And, anyways, it was really the picture of him giving her the Furby that made her laugh. The broken Furby that she was now embarrassed to own diminished that memory. Her favorite stuffed rabbit would never turn up real because she loved it so much. Plus, her best memories were of their vacations, hours at the dog park, sitting on the beach with books.

Third Lesson: The things don't have the memories. We hold the memories. Everything else is inanimate, and at the very most reminds you of a memory.

Now the little girl faces one more lesson. The ability to give up things that work, even if they don't work very well. And here is how she is learning that lesson:

Yes, another refrigerator. This time it is a faded ugly Golden Harvest Montgomery Ward fridge estimated at 35 years of age. How can it still be working? It is noisy, not efficient, impossible to organize, and food seems to go bad faster than it should, but the little girl reasoned "why should we throw it in the landfill if it is still working?" It felt wrong to throw it away, even though it was using more electricity than a newer model. Turns out that the electric company is paying people $40 to get appliances like this off the grid. The PackRat loses again. On Saturday a gleaming white refrigerator will be delivered. It even has a deli drawer and large shelves on the doors. Who knew a deli drawer could be so exciting?

I know that no matter what I do I will still have that little nagging girl on my shoulder trying to keep the green fridge. And if for whatever reason, the little girl shuts up, my parents are happy to share the story with me anytime I mention that I got rid of something or if I try to convince them to get rid of things I feel they don't need. But I've also learned that some people are happy to have lots of things and they do get satisfaction of seeing them every day. For me though, I think I will keep trying to make the most of my experiences and not clutter up our little bungalow.

(The 25 year old furnace is shuddering as he realizes his days are numbered!)