Q. My wife can’t resist claiming anything that people leave out on the nature strip for free. How can a wannabe minimalist get along with a confirmed hoarder?
M.D., Oakleigh, Vic
Credit:Simon Letch
A. I think we have the same taste in women. Anytime my wife goes out anywhere, even if she just pops out for bread and milk, she’ll come back with some rotting hunk of mouldy old crap she found on the side of the street – then she’ll drag it into our house, her holding one end, 2000 nesting earwigs helping out with the other. Borer-riddled tables, faulty old appliances, wonky-legged chairs that you can’t put your weight on – you have to hover over them like you’re using an airport toilet. Once, she came home with four perfectly good Bentwood dining chairs that she found on a nature strip; she said she almost didn’t see them there because they were hidden behind a half-filled removalist truck.
Loading
And I’m exactly like you: a minimalist. My idea of a perfect house is clean, white walls; clean, uncluttered floors; clean, empty spaces – and, just to break things up a bit, a corner (just the one will do). So I also know the excruciating agony of watching mounds of junk collect in your home. Our living room looks like a deceased estate auction that someone forgot to advertise.
But even though you and I have cold, empty, minimalist hearts, we must learn to accept that junk collecting makes our partners happy; we must learn to respect their passion for recycling; we must learn to sit in that damp, upholstered armchair that itches like something’s laying eggs in your buttocks. And you know, every now and then they bring home something truly wonderful that can be treasured for years and years to come. Well, maybe about three years – until the borers finish it off.
To read more from Good Weekend magazine, visit our page at The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age and Brisbane Times.
The best of Good Weekend delivered to your inbox every Saturday morning. Sign up here.
For all the latest Life Style News Click Here
For the latest news and updates, follow us on Google News.
Denial of responsibility! NewsBit.us is an automatic aggregator around the global media. All the content are available free on Internet. We have just arranged it in one platform for educational purpose only. In each content, the hyperlink to the primary source is specified. All trademarks belong to their rightful owners, all materials to their authors. If you are the owner of the content and do not want us to publish your materials on our website, please contact us by email – [email protected]. The content will be deleted within 24 hours.
