Getting Rid of Stuff

I love getting rid of stuff. Almost as much as I like getting new stuff. I might like getting rid of stuff because it means I can get new stuff. Maybe. But I still love to purge. Not food mind you. Luckily I have never battled with an eating disorder-I like my food too much. But I love purging stuff. I love that feeling I get from getting rid of the useless junk piled up in my basement. It's so satisfying, like a weight has been lifted off my chest. Getting rid of junk also greatly improves my husband's mood. He doesn't quite understand my love for junk. So I embarked on part 17 of a Major Purge this past weekend. This Purge is so big it requires Capital Letters.

I refuse to throw things away, so I am a donating/freecycling machine. Some people can just shove it all in a trash can and call it a day, but I can't. Partly because I love the Earth and partly because of the the recently-discovered super-cheap streak I have deep in my bones. Getting something for less has always appealed to me-I grew up always being broke. And now that I have the money to afford nice, decent things (and then some), I still refuse to overpay for things. I work hard for my money dangit. So you better treat me right and give me an excellent deal. That means I am obsessed with thrifting and freecycle. Why should a slightly imperfect lounge chair sit in a landfill when someone else could make good use of it? Why should I drop a stack of wedding magazines in the recycle bin when someone might get good use out of them without having to buy them? I strongly believe in paying the junk forward. I know that If I put good, useful-to-someone-else junk out into the world, useful-to-me junk will eventually appear. It's the circle of life.

Back to the Major Purge. I finally said goodbye to a HUGE pile of clothes. I really have to watch my clothing intake/outtake or I may end up on an episode of Hoarders soon. But off to the Goodwill they went. I even managed to sweet-talk the hubs into donating a bunch of clothes. Double purge-I love it! And in return, the Goodwill gods blessed me with a Lilly Pulitzer dress in my size, a pair of JCrew Matchstick jeans in my size and a Coach leather purse perfect for the Fall. I love it!

I also Freecycled a huge pile of stuff that was just taking up space. I was able to get rid of a ton of scrapbooking stuff I'll never use, a pile of greeting cards I've never touched and a stack of magazines. But my best freecycle of the weekend was the useless box of plastic tubes I had sitting in my basement. About a month ago, I bought plastic shelving off of craigslist (half the cost of Home Depot and in excellent condition!) The seller gave me enough supports for 3 more sets of shelves, and I was stuck with a box full of 12" long plastic tubes. What the heck am I going to do with 25 plastic tubes? I could have shoved them all in a couple garbage bags and thrown them out, and I would have if it came to that. But I wanted to list them on Freecycle first, just to see what would happen. And a women who builds crazy cakes is now getting good use out of them. I love that!

I'm enjoying the feeling of the purge just talking about it. Ahhhh...