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["Gloria Morris" <gloriamorris59 AT gmail.com>]

Hey, Gene,
I hate to spoil it for you, but I am going to take Chris' side here. I
am of the mindset that if it is of no use to you now, why keep it?
Sell it. Pass it along to others who might use it. You don't need to
send it to a landfill, just give it away. Not that this applies to
you, but materialism can be such that no matter the size of the house
or the size of the closet, it is filled with unused things irrelevant
to people's lives. There is a notion amongst many that these things
will somehow make us happy, or that the absence of things will mean a
critical need is unmet at some point in the future. And so things
become a sort of false security, requiring an ever bigger abode to
house them all, or else an ever more cluttered abode. If I have
learned anything, it is that once your basic needs are met, keeping
unused and useless things around is actually enslaving. Get rid of the
unused stuff. Liberate yourself. ;-)
Gloria

On 3/8/07, Gene GeRue <genegerue AT ruralize.com> wrote:
> Chris is in a closet-cleaning mode and repercussions abound. A
> permanent lifestyle change dilemma unanticipated: to keep or not to
> keep my shoeshine kit. Probability of future use is slim. Except for
> weddings and funerals—the latter which in the Ozarks are commonly
> attended in clean bib overalls—there is little likelihood of wearing
> a suit or even a sport coat, and then the latter more likely with the
> now-popular shoes evolved from sports, shoes that at any rate exhibit
> no shiny leather. But to toss the kit, which contains shoe polish in
> brown, black, cordovan and white, plus application and shining
> brushes for each color, means tossing something of value, hard to do
> for a boy who grew up poor and who admires the mindset of use it up,
> wear it out, make it do, or do without. There is then the further
> associated question of which shoes to keep or donate to Goodwill. It
> is hard to give up perfectly good shoes, old and true friends of many
> years. The cowboy boots, the dress boots, the loafers, ah, a life of
> decadence flashes before one's eyes. There may be future
> grandchildren weddings, if such anachronism survives, and if joinings
> together in fact entail dress clothes. There is the further issue of
> moulding leather, common in an old Ozarks farmhouse. I have one
> answer but seek a menu. Come to my aid, wise homesteaders!