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The Crowded House CDs are staying, too

By ROBERT FRIEDMAN
Published November 20, 2005

So-called "clutter" is a contentious subject in the Stein-Friedman household.

One person's treasure trove of heirlooms, keepsakes, literary correspondence and future artifacts, I have come to learn, is another person's musty litter of eyesores, space eaters, fire hazards and roach sanctuaries.

Take, for example, my more or less comprehensive Sports Illustrated collection, dating to 1974, stacked in no particular order in various crannies of our home. I can't say I go back and thumb through an old SI every day; after all, the coffee table is covered with three or four recent issues I haven't gotten around to glancing at yet. But it gives me great solace to know they are there, sitting silently like the hallway smoke detector, if needed.

And, despite what some people suggest, just because I haven't looked at some of them in 30 years doesn't mean I won't look at them tomorrow. What if Hurricane Omega comes barreling in on short notice from the Bay of Campeche, and we find ourselves stranded at home, without power? Sprightly conversation in the candle-lit Florida room will not fully compensate for the imposing silence of a disabled television.

By about Day 3, I might well decide to take a little trip down memory lane and check out, say, Dr. Z's weekly prognostications for the 1993 NFL season. I can't remember who actually won any of those games, but just rereading the logic upon which Dr. Z based his picks might provide me with some small advantage if I were ever to consider placing a wager on a future sporting contest.

If those SI back issues somehow wound up at the recycling center - as a large box of old National Lampoons, 1986 Rutland Bank statements, Physics 101 textbooks from the pre-string-theory era and a painstakingly preserved collection of logo golf tees from five continents mysteriously did a few weeks ago - the opportunity to profit from Dr. Z's time-honored wisdom would be trashed as well.

The motivations for rereading a classic SI issue need not be so crass. Maybe I'd just like to rediscover some of the great writing of Roy Blount Jr. or Gary Smith, or reflect on the fragility of fame by reliving the heyday of some former boxing champion who's now confined to an assisted-living facility in Palookaville.

Or, if all the old swimsuit issues are still lying around - and I'm betting that they are, unless somebody stumbled across them while she was rounding up those golf tees for the Dumpster - I could arrange them chronologically and watch Christie Brinkley grow up before my eyes.

Christie's almost as old as I am, though you'd never know it from those infomercials she does with Chuck Norris, so she's probably been on more SI covers than Muhammad Ali. But what would you rather hang on to: A few harmless photos of Christie Brinkley wearing three clamshells and a shoelace? Or a few hundred festive holiday snapshots of any number of third cousins in the extremely extended Stein family whose semirecognizable faces pop up on page after page of the stacks of photo albums and scrapbooks that take up half a bedroom, not that I'm suggesting we have a clutter double standard or anything.

And once you start throwing away pieces of your life, where does it all end? Should I get rid of all these albums? A lot of magic memories and heavy changes are etched in the grooves of that vinyl, man. Some of these albums would be worth a lot of money if we hadn't used them for Frisbees, beer coasters and chopping blocks back in the day.

Here, I'll just pull one off the shelf at random ... Spooky Tooth! You Broke My Heart So I Busted Your Jaw! What a great record! Life-affirming, really.

I even remember exactly where I was when I first heard it: my friend Kenny's house!

Well, we were always at Kenny's house back then.

I'd be tempted to stop and listen to Spooky Tooth right now, if I weren't so busy writing this column. And if our turntable still worked.

Some things can go. I'm willing to unload the stack of high-tech razors - Mach 3s and Xtreme 4s and such - various relatives and well-wishers have sent me over the years to encourage me to shave regularly. And we really should think about donating the unopened boxes of fine china and cutlery my mother sent us for about 16 consecutive Christmases in the vain hope that we'd finally stop eating all our meals out of foam boxes.

I guess we could do without the Elvis memorabilia and the Ronald Reagan blow-up doll if we ever get in a real pinch for space. But all the books are staying, except for the obsolete physics texts.

I remember having written a perfectly acceptable review of Silas Marner back in seventh grade, even though I didn't read a word of the book. I'd probably appreciate George Eliot more now. Maybe I'll get around to reading him (or is it her?) one day. Or at least a kindly volunteer might read Silas Marner to me when I'm sharing a room with that ex-boxer in Palookaville.

I think we hold on to so much stuff not because we want to live in the past but because we want to maintain the illusion our futures are so expansive that we'll eventually have nothing better to do than read Silas Marner or listen to Spooky Tooth again.

As George Eliot said, "The golden moments in the stream of life rush past us, and we see nothing but sand; the angels come to visit us, and we only know them when they are gone." But then, he (or she) also said, "It's never too late to be who you might have been," so he (or she) ought to make up his (or her) mind.

[Last modified November 18, 2005, 18:51:02]