blue artichoke

Before I left for Cancun, I read a particularly disappointing book, Not Buying It: My Year Without Shopping, by Judith Levine. I had high hopes for the book, thinking it would be about the struggles of making do with what you have and learning to not want what you don’t need. And I was really curious about how she’d get by without buying things like toilet paper, tampons, toothpaste, soap, etc. Well, to save you from a disappointing read, she bought all those things, plus a lot of other things she considered “necessities.” That wasn’t the disappointing part, though. This book was less about her experience of dropping out of consumer culture as it was a political rant against the Bush administration’s efforts to encourage economic health following 9-11 and the chronicling of her small town’s debate of whether to install a garish 200-ft cell phone tower (a compromise was reached, allowing a 100-ft cell phone tower, which pleased no one).

The book, however, got me thinking about my shopping habits. GC and I are both fairly frugal. We don’t collect anything, and except for the new tv that we got for each other for Christmas last year, we don’t splurge on big ticket toys. We don’t have chotchkes; neither of us are clothes hounds and our music and DVD collection is reasonable. Even so, I think I have too much stuff. I can’t fit everything I own into my car, unless I start driving a moving van. So, my next project is to stop buying things. Thirty days seems too easy, so for the next 3 months (starting yesterday, April 1), I can buy only disposable and consumable items. That means no clothes, jewelry, trinkets, candlesticks, shoes, books, CDs, decorations, kitchen accessories or chotchkes. Nothing frivolous, just things designed to be consumed or used up and thrown away (deoderant, BenGay patches, toothpaste, etc.). I thought about this project in Cancun, as I noticed that my favorite black flip flops were about to break, and decided to extend the shopping restriction to include replacing things I already have and use frequently, like a new pair of black flip flops when these finally break. I don’t think this will be very difficult for me, but time will tell.

Getting to Know All About You: What one item could you not live without?