I'm pretty ashamed about this and I bet most of us are in the same situation

Miscellaneous
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A while ago, my wife made friends with an elderly disabled man who was very down on his luck. She’s helped him in a variety of ways, including getting him into some pretty nice low-income housing. He wanted to have us over for dinner to show us his new place. He gave us the grand tour, and it was a pretty nice one-bedroom apartment that had just been built. He took us back to his bedroom with a mattress on the floor and then showed us his walk-in closet that had a washer/dryer combo. In this medium-sized walk-in closet hung 4 nicely-cleaned shirts and two pairs of pants, and a ball cap. All the clothes that he owned.

He pointed out his washer/dryer and said, “Now I can wear a shirt and wash the other… or I can skip a day or two!”

I thought about my own closet. Over the last 20 years, it has been stuffed to the brim with clothes I mostly hadn’t worn in years. So many choices, but ironically I really only wear about 10 different shirts, if that.

There’s a clothes drive coming up for refugees, and I decided I was going to clear it all out. Anything that didn’t fit, no matter my weight-loss aspirations, had to go. Anything that I hadn’t worn in the past year had to go. I filled up NINE garbage bags of clothing. If we go by the clothing ratio of our friend’s closet, those clothes could probably help 50-70 people.

Granted, a lot of the clothing I have was given to me. A lot was retained because I was being frugal (I’ll wear it again someday). But even after my great clothing purge, I still have a LOT of clothes. Even with what I said in mind I would still say to myself, “I need a few ‘work’ tees to work in the yard or on the car.” So I kept 4-5 of those… when do I ever need that many?

Do I really need more than a week’s worth of clothes? Maybe summer and winter, so 14 shirts, plus two work shirts? Do I need 40 pairs of socks? 70 ties? Does anyone wear dress shirts to the office anymore? I’m going to have to do this all again.

I estimate I got rid of about 85% of my stuff, and still have an embarrassment of wealth.

Anyway, I’m just thinking and sharing. We all could probably simplify a lot in this regard. Winter is coming. Maybe that dress shirt you have with the neck that is now too tight might help somebody get a job. Consider cleaning out.

And sorry if I sound sanctimonious; that’s not my intent. Just writing this down and shaming myself publicly so hopefully I don’t get back into the state I was in.

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I would agree. I don’t work anymore and have no need to show up anywhere in my work casual wardrobe. Thanks for the reminder. Now’s the time to start paring down and cleaning out the closets. Someone else could certainly use my stuff.

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Great thoughts Rocker.

I think for most of us it’s not just clothes, it’s everything. I have 3 tablets. One for upstairs, another for downstairs and a backup just in case. That’s just lazy and excessive on my part. God forbid I have to climb up or down stairs to get my iPad.

We’ve been working on downsizing, but we still have a long way to go. I love hanging out in the rooms of my house that are open with minimal clutter. They’re more enjoyable, peaceful, easier to clean and comfortable.

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A thousand red stars for @RockerUte

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One of the great things about moving four years ago was we spent the prior 2 1/2 years periodically getting rid of things in anticipation. Now, after four years settled, there’s probably more than six years ago. A couple of months ago I counted my golf/polo shirts. 41! Ridiculous. Got rid of 15 without much worry. Could do more.

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I’m embarrassed to admit how many band/concert t-shirts I have. Most of which I will probably never wear again.

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That’s literally my entire casual wardrobe, no exaggeration.

I have one Utah t-shirt, one Star Wars t-shirt and around 50 metal band t-shirts. In winter, it switches to long sleeve metal band shirts or band hoodies. I have reached the storage limit in my dresser though, so now every time I get a new one I toss an old one. That said, there’s a few of my faves that I’ll never get rid of and are older than my kids (17 and 13).

Seeing me outside of work without a band shirt on would be extremely rare.

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My dad was t-shirts with pockets. He needed the pocket for his smokes. :wink:

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I need the pocket on my t-shirts for my reading glasses.

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For my FIL, it’s for his nerd pack. Dude hasn’t been employed for almost 30 years, but that damned thing is still there.

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Remember those candy cigarettes? The whole tobacco industry was highly cynical corruption on steroids.

That was part of my catalog of reasons to think many of the adults were pretty marginal in their cognitive and critical thinking skills, back then.

  • The US economy was going to be destroyed by the move to unleaded gasoline.
  • The metric system was a communist plot. Learning that system in the 7th grade was another “WTH?” moment for me trying to piece things together.
  • “Why won’t they come clean about Roswell?”
  • Etc
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Good reminder, Rocker. The clothing we have that we don’t wear anymore or have even forgotten about can make another person’s day (or year). And we all have that stuff in our closets or basements.

I’m never giving up my “Nuke BYU” cap, however.

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