You can't take it with you.

My mother was an extreme example in one direction. She kind of felt the best if there was nothing in your closet. Then it was really neat and tidy. One year in high school I saved up my waitress money and bought a very nice suede coat that I had coveted for a long time. I bought it in late winter when it was on sale. That summer I went to Nantucket to work and play for the summer. When I got home to pack for school, the coat was gone. When I confronted Mom, she said "That old thing, you hadn't worn it in months". It was summer! Dios Mio!

I hope I am not that bad. But living on a sailboat made me realize how simple life is with the "one thing on, one thing off" rule. If you collected stuff on a sailboat, then sailing was either out of the question or such a big hassle stowing everything that it wasn't worth the hassle. You just didn't have enough stowage space. And quite remarkably I almost always had whatever I needed when I needed it.

But, a lot of people have the opposite problem. I even have seen it with visitors here in Nicaragua. People ask what they should bring for a week or two. I say, "bathing suit, shorts, top, skirt, hairbrush, sunglasses" that's about it. Then friends arrive with huge suitcases complaining about the overweight fees. That is not a big deal. But since hoarding has become a psych diagnosis, and the TV show about the disease has been showing, it gets you thinking. How many sets of dishes does anyone need? How many plastic bags do you have to collect? How many pairs of shoes will make you happy?

I think the old depression argument about saving string is no longer relevant. I have friends with two big houses, fully furnished and three storage units stacked to the brim and kids who don't want any of it because they already have furnished their houses. It starts to get scary. I went to a baby shower where the mother-to-be must have gotten sixty newborn outfits for one little baby. And I know people who live near stores and have enough money and yet have to buy generators in case the electric goes off so their freezers don't melt.

I am not trying to sound righteous here. My oldest daughter can get in a few licks about doll houses that vanished with my cleaning. But I am thinking about how weird it is to be buried in stuff you have to clean, move, arrange, think about, store, deal with, handle again and again and so on.

Louis, my acupuncture doc says the Chinese call the problem a 'sorting disorder'. Treatable by ...acupuncture. A person with this gives the same weight to a decision about whether to throw away an old newspaper clipping as whether to give away Mom's china. It all ends up staying.

Lama Marut suggests that the mantra for us today be "Aum, I have enough, ahum." The 'aum' and 'ahum' are a little Sanscrit or Tibetan to make it sound authentic. I have enough stuff. I have enough love. I have enough respect. I have enough support. I have enough money. I have enough friends. I have enough good looks. I have enough education. WOW. It really starts to feel good. That one little sentence. "I have enough" Problem solved.