One of my favorite Carlin routines was
Transcribed here:
Actually this is just a place for my stuff, ya know? That's all, a little place for my stuff. That's all I want, that's all you need in life, is a little place for your stuff, ya know? I can see it on your table, everybody's got a little place for their stuff. This is my stuff, that's your stuff, that'll be his stuff over there. That's all you need in life, a little place for your stuff. That's all your house is: a place to keep your stuff. If you didn't have so much stuff, you wouldn't need a house. You could just walk around all the time.
A house is just a pile of stuff with a cover on it. You can see that when you're taking off in an airplane. You look down, you see everybody's got a little pile of stuff. All the little piles of stuff. And when you leave your house, you gotta lock it up. Wouldn't want somebody to come by and take some of your stuff. They always take the good stuff. They never bother with that crap you're saving. All they want is the shiny stuff. That's what your house is, a place to keep your stuff while you go out and get...more stuff!
Sometimes you gotta move, gotta get a bigger house. Why? No room for your stuff anymore. Did you ever notice when you go to somebody else's house, you never quite feel a hundred percent at home? You know why? No room for your stuff. Somebody else's stuff is all over the place! And if you stay overnight, unexpectedly, they give you a little bedroom to sleep in. Bedroom they haven't used in about eleven years. Someone died in it, eleven years ago. And they haven't moved any of his stuff! Right next to the bed there's usually a dresser or a bureau of some kind, and there's NO ROOM for your stuff on it. Somebody else's shit is on the dresser.
Have you noticed that their stuff is shit and your shit is stuff? God! And you say, "Get that shit offa there and let me put my stuff down!"
Sometimes you leave your house to go on vacation. And you gotta take some of your stuff with you. Gotta take about two big suitcases full of stuff, when you go on vacation. You gotta take a smaller version of your house. It's the second version of your stuff. And you're gonna fly all the way to Honolulu. Gonna go across the continent, across half an ocean to Honolulu. You get down to the hotel room in Honolulu and you open up your suitcase and you put away all your stuff. "Here's a place here, put a little bit of stuff there, put some stuff here, put some stuff--you put your stuff there, I'll put some stuff--here's another place for stuff, look at this, I'll put some stuff here..." And even though you're far away from home, you start to get used to it, you start to feel okay, because after all, you do have some of your stuff with you. That's when your friend calls up from Maui, and says, "Hey, why don'tchya come over to Maui for the weekend and spend a couple of nights over here."
Oh, no! Now what do I pack? Right, you've gotta pack an even SMALLER version of your stuff. The third version of your house. Just enough stuff to take to Maui for a coupla days. You get over to Maui--I mean you're really getting extended now, when you think about it. You got stuff ALL the way back on the mainland, you got stuff on another island, you got stuff on this island. I mean, supply lines are getting longer and harder to maintain. You get over to your friend's house on Maui and he gives you a little place to sleep, a little bed right next to his windowsill or something. You put some of your stuff up there. You put your stuff up there. You got your Visine, you got your nail clippers, and you put everything up. It takes about an hour and a half, but after a while you finally feel okay, say, "All right, I got my nail clippers, I must be okay." That's when your friend says, "Aaaaay, I think tonight we'll go over the other side of the island, visit a pal of mine and maybe stay over."
Aww, no. NOW what do you pack? Right--you gotta pack an even SMALLER version of your stuff. The fourth version of your house. Only the stuff you know you're gonna need. Money, keys, comb, wallet, lighter, hanky, pen, smokes, rubber and change. Well, only the stuff you HOPE you're gonna need.
The reason it was so funny...is because, like the rest of his observational humor, it was sooooo true.
In the book, Mayes touches briefly on The Stuff of her Childhood Georgian home. First of all, nobody does STUFF like the South. I learned this when I married into a Southern Family. It is amazing...bordering on pathological, okay?
"Oh...that there...that's my great, great, great, grandpappy's rocking chair...well what's left of it, anyways..and we must move it with us forever, because it once't belonged to family."
You think I'm joking?
I'm not.
It is the reason I still have a 1920's hand-made piano and bench, and an even older claw footed (with the glass balls) piano stool STILL in my home.
Minimalist that I am these days...and despite the fact my late husband and I (or maybe because of it) moved the piano on four backbreaking separate occasions...one including stairs...and that is weighs roughly the same as a small Buick.
Go figure.
And I don't even PLAY the piano.
I grew up (was raised) by two grandparents who survived the Great Depression.
My husband grew up with his mother who had also survived it. Plus the whole Southern Background thing.
Their identical rally cry
"Never EVER EVER throw anything away...EVER!!!"
It was a job they took very seriously.
My husband added his own corollary
"If anyone throws anything in the house away...you must immediately retrieve said item and return it to it's original cabinet, drawer or cardboard box as soon as humanly possible."
We were the Oscar and Felix of STUFF.
In retrospect, it must have been frustrating for him, too.
It certainly was for me.
I remember throwing away a dilapidated teflon-peeling couldn't fry anything in it if you wanted to...skillet at least six times. Only to find it reappeared like some Stephen King Novel Shit in its cabinet, the next day.
I never said a word.
To his credit...neither did he.
I can laugh about it now...but I doubt that either of us found it funny at the time.
In fact, in the year after his death, I think I threw the damned thing away twice...and then retrieved it myself.
When I made the move from The Rose Cottage...and placed it in the bin-bag the final time...only days before we left...I half expected to open the cabinet the next morning and see its peeling face, once again, staring out accusingly.
When it wasn't...I felt a deep sadness. Our game...like our life together...had came to an end.
And it didn't particularly feel like I had won.
After cleaning up the detritus of my grandparent's lives, my mother-in-law's, and my late husband's (All World Class Hoarders) I took Thoreau's words to heart before my move...
"Simplify, Simplify, Simplify"
And, for the most part, I have.
I still have objects from all of them that I can't quite bear to part with...but the chaos is much smaller.
A large silver serving spoon of Mom's that must have scooped thousands of scoops of Macaroni salads, topped with hard-boiled egg slices, in its day.
A Pipestone carved into a pipe bowl and crouching monkey found on a riverbank during a fishing trip with Dad.
A black leather beret of Bill's bought during an Anniversary Adventure in Brown County. The band inside still smells like him after 6 years.
Other miscellaneous items from throughout my life that wouldn't mean a thing to anyone except me.
Oh, and Aunt Edna's Piano and bench.
And the piano stool from Wiggins, Mississippi.
The Den, my home, just a little place for "My Stuff"
