Years' accumulation of
dumb stuff finally brings man to knees
 So Linda Blair was the victim of demonic possession. Big
deal. I'm the victim of demonic possessions. I've got so much stuff I've accumulated over the
years to get rid of, and I'm completely paralyzed. But I have to throw all this junk into my Hefty Ultra Flex bags and say,
arrivederci, baby. These things are like a pop culture albatross around my
neck.
I look
around me and all I see is crap. Crap, crap, crap. I look on my shelves and a
row of Little Rascal videotapes mock me: "Otay ... what are you gonna do with
us now?" Porky and Buckwheat laughing at my expense and giving me the finger.
My shelf of musicals, from Kiss Me Kate
to Thank Your Lucky Stars to Gold Diggers of 1933. Doris Day and
Gordon McRae in On Moonlight Bay. Fiddler on the Roof. I have Oliver!, for god's sake. What was I
thinking? Do libraries even take this stuff off people's hands anymore?
The library
certainly isn't going to take my 13 Playboy videos from the 1990s. I asked for
them as bonuses with my paid subscription, yet another bad idea. Most are still
in their shrink wrap, The Playmate video calendars - all those Shannons and
Kimberlys - lying around, completely unogled, through these years.
Oh, I watched College Girls when I first received it,
but that's it. Maybe a few minutes of Sexy
Lingerie V and Erotic Fantasies II and The Best of Jenny McCarthy. I never
busted out Wet and Wild: The Locker Room or Girls of Spring Break. And now these
women are too young for me. Anyone want to take them off my hands? A buck a
tape, no problem. Don't worry, the tapes may be old, but they still show their
nudities.
I've got plenty of DVDs, too,
that I need to shed. I went on a TV-season buying spree. The Sopranos, Six Feet Under and The Wire, no problem, keepers. But why, oh why, did I buy a season
of Without a Trace? That show sucks.
All Jerry Bruckheimer shows suck. Forty-five bucks flushed down the toi-toi.
God. What's the matter with me.
I bought seasons of Boston Legal, Nip/Tuck, Freaks and Geeks,
NYPD Blue, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, House,
The West Wing, Homicide, Sports Night, The Simpsons
... I own the complete Sex and the City
series, which I first saw just this year. I dig the New York City eye candy and
bitterly cussing out Sarah Jessica Parker. Has there ever been a vainer, more
self-absorbed twit than Sarah Jessica Parker in that show? Holy shit. I enjoy
yelling at her even though I guess I'm running a little late on this thing.
Anyway, you name it, if it's TV
and it's boxed, I got it. I must have this premonition I'm going to be laid up
for months at a time, with nothing to do but watch TV series on DVD. I spend so
much time on Amazon I should wear a pith helmet.
At least these things are
rectangular in nature, and thus easily packed for dispersal elsewhere. Same
with the hundreds of books on the shelves. Dozens of Life magazines from the '30s and '40s, old Plain Dealers marking the signature events of our time ("Browns
Sack Bernie"), 10 years worth of Free Times
(boy, that takes up some serious space). All stackable and storable.
But I really get overwhelmed and
depressed by all the miscellaneous stuff. The busted mini-trampoline, which I
bounced out of commission, under the bed. The Chairman, the hideous, bright red
resistant rubber-band fitness system sitting, unworked-out on for years, in the
bedroom. The old golf clubs that were probably last used during the Truman
administration. The voodoo masks. The single water ski. The jackalope head. The
antique Quinlan's pretzel can with the hayseed Pretzel Boy ("I will keep your
pretzels crisp and tasty").
The 8mm movie projector and stack
of silent movies I got from Blackhawk Films in the 1960s. What am I going to do
with this 8mm copy of D.W. Griffith's 1916 epic Intolerance my parents bought for me? (I was a strange child.) It's
13 reels of hard-hitting (but very quiet) historical drama. You can't just toss
a pioneering motion picture starring Lillian Gish and Bessie Love into a
plastic garbage bag!
I can't
toss the cardboard baby, either. I don't have the heart. That cardboard baby is
the symbol of my inability to get rid of stuff. It looks up at me and gurgles,
"Ha ha. You can't throw the baby out, or the bathwater, or anything else.
You're just going to drown in it all. You pud."
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