It’s Decluttering Time again: time to unload my home of accumulated stuff. The longer I live, the more I shop, and inherit, and acquire. It piles up quickly, unnoticeable at first as the newly cleared closets and shelves easily accommodate incoming treasure. Every third or fourth winter though, when the ice and cold keep me in the house for long stretches of time, I start noticing how the stuff starts dripping from every crammed corner. Some folks do an annual Spring Cleaning. But once I begin noticing this excessive acquisition of possessions, even in the harshest, most inconvenient and dismal season, I have to purge the place—pronto—before it can bury me.
At Upstate Shredding in Owego, NY, there were different landscapes everywhere I looked as mountains of sorted junk were being shredded, cleaned and sold to foundries and mills all around the world, to be reprocessed and made into new products. More stuff.
Altered Horizons 34
“I don’t think I can do this.” I stood over my bin of plastic bags. “Earth Day’s coming, and I should be able to do this one simple thing for our planet,” I told myself. After decades of hoarding plastic shopping bags, I was considering eradicating them from my routine. But I kept coming back to all the things I do with these bags. Like carry gym-clothes and potluck dishes. Like use them for trashcan liners and dog-poo bags. They make great stuffing for stuffed-animal art projects. And long ago, inspired by Tom Knight’s song, 
“Don’t give me anything unless I can eat it,” I keep telling family and friends as holidays approach. Meanwhile, the health club hounds me to participate in some program where I can win prizes. “No more stuff. Please. I have too much.”