It's Genetic

My plan for this weekend was to purge the house of all of the "stuff" that we have acquired that nobody ever uses. This is easier said than done. My children only part with things under the threat that "NOTHING NEW WILL COME INTO THIS HOUSE UNTIL SOMETHING ELSE LEAVES." Toys that they haven't looked at in years suddenly become their most cherished possession when you want to get rid of it. I have developed a theory that our family has a sort of pack-rat gene somewhere within our DNA. Both of our mothers have the gene. Our children are playing with toys and books that are over 30 years old (I know I should have written "close to 40 years old" but I can't quite go there yet). The stuff that they deemed worthy of keeping and storing for this long boggles my mind. Scott's dad has a version of the gene, although I'm not sure if his is more a form of cheapness than nostalgia (and I say that with love). I thought that the gene had maybe skipped a generation, as I do not posses it. I am all for getting rid of things that have no use. Purge, simplify, and ridding your life of clutter is what I am about these days. Scott's sister, Susan, has no trace of this anywhere in her DNA. In fact, when she went on vacation recently, she had a box built for her 19 year old cat in case he died while she was away. She wanted her buried and gone before she even got home. I wanted to warn the cat not to take a nap until after someone came to feed her, because if she was sleeping it might not end well! And I thought that Scott didn't have the gene until I ventured into our garage yesterday, otherwise know as the place where crap goes not to die, but to live in perpetuity. There is a truck, motorcycle, and dirt bike that have not seen the light of day in almost a decade. I dug through the truck bed, which has become a storage unit, and found an old gas tank (not a gas can, mind you, but a gas tank) a big exhaust fan that had a purpose at a house we haven't lived in for ten years, a chain saw that I didn't even know we owned (you never know, one of the TWO trees in our yard might need to come down someday), and parts for cars that I don't think we even own anymore. So my conclusion was that Scott does possess this genetic flaw and has passed it along to our boys, as every bike, scooter, and riding toy they ever owned was still in that garage. So alas, I am attempting to break the cycle and all of this "stuff" is being shipped off to the Goodwill or the recycling center, so in 30 years if any of it is pulled out of an attic for some kid to play with, they won't be related to me.