As makers of things, we nerds are responsible for an awful lot of junk that needs to be thrown out. What's the best way to handle this? I doubt it's what my dear hubby (DH) does. He secretly stashes his old electronic equipment in our attic and stacks his old nerd clothes in our closet. Take his 10 year-old sweat pants, for example. Please take them! DH wants to either hang on to them for another 10 years or give them away to some poor person. Who would want them, though? I take care of my sweat pants as you can hopefully see from the picture. I can't say the same for DH.Today we had another heated discussion about the disposal of old things such as his sweat pants. I want to throw them in the trash. DH insists that we could give them to the Salvation Army store. He objects to the rampant consumerism he sees in the US and the excessive resource usage caused by producing and marketing a new pair of sweat pants. His points (if not his pants) are valid, but, did I mention that the sweat pants are stinky, smeared with grass stains, and holey? And when I say "holey" I mean full of holes, not sacred, despite DH's belief that the pants will somehow reincarnate into something that will save a poor homeless person from nakedness in the Salvation Army.
Now, I'm an environmentalist too. I was one of the first people I know to recycle bottles and cans. In grad school my roommates and I depended on the extra money we made from recycling. How else could we afford new cans of Mountain Dew? But when DH gets stubborn and illogical about his sweat pants and other old stuff, I tend to overreact. The end result? I drove to the Salvation Army in an attempt to make the sweat pants disappear. Yes, I admit I actually polluted the air in order to drive to the store to get rid of the sweat pants.
The Salvation Army said "no thank you!" They didn't want the sweat pants. Can you blame them? Luckily I'd also brought lots of my clean, un-torn, designer blouses and slacks to give away too. Then, I admit, I actually drove another 10 miles to the mall. There I bought a new pair of warm, fleece, sweat pants, just like DH's old ones, for $4.00 at JCPenney. Seriously, only $4.00! Does this make me a bad person? Were the sweat pants made in a sweat shop? I made JCPenney happy but what would JC do? Will I still find salvation?
Well all's well that ends well. DH is wearing his new sweat pants and didn't yell at me for driving to the mall. Oh, and by the way, we still have the old sweat pants. Would anyone like them? I'll walk to your house and deliver them in an environmentally-safe manner if you will puh-leeze take them off our hands.
My husband's the same way. Even if a shirt has a hole or a stain, he insists we give it to Goodwill and let them decide if they want it.
ReplyDeleteThat was extremely funny. It reminds me of my favorite nightgown which Moira hated! It was true I had other nightgowns with which to clothe my body but none of them were so WARM. Of course this one had been a little too warm, so I chopped the sleeves in half, and threw way the borrom half.
ReplyDeleteMy dedication to "reuse" was well serve by the nightgown! I know Obama would have appreciate it
You know what Moira did though - she bought me an irresistible floor length nightgown! I think there have been a turn or two left in the old one but eventually she won it awaa from me and disposed of it some where I could not retrieve it!
I would totally have taken them. Now that I'm going on a bike tour, I need some sweats to use in the sleeping bag at night. I've turned the house upside-down looking for my old ones, but I think my wife quietly disposed of mine without telling me.
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