Space: The Final Frontier

or the Confessions of a Addict

It starts out quite harmlessly, perhaps at the insistence of a friend, peer pressure as it has become to be known. It seemed harmless enough; after all it was just a “one off”, and not something you were intending to become a habit. Not like those others, all consumed by the drive for more. You know them, with their excuses of being able to stop at anytime, no one is getting hurt and staying well within their financial parameters.  After a while you started to look for more sources, buying wherever and whenever you could, tying the purchases to every aspect of your life. Vacations, business trips and days off all centering around getting more until you start using money you have yet to earned, getting out  the plastic, the card, the old swipe and carry; “they” make it seem so easy. Then comes month’s end and payment must be made, made for product that you have already acquired and it seems pointless to have to pay for something you already have. Pay the minimum and you’re good for another month of obsession.

Yes, it starts out as one item, a single item, a curiosity some would call it, then another similar or related object makes itself available and you have two; it’s only two, a pair nothing more. Besides they look good displayed on the mantle or bookshelf, what harm could that do? Then, much without you even realizing why, a third appears and you have three, you now have a collection my friend; a small collection to be sure but a collection all the same. No big deal it’s not that it takes up a lot of space; after all you can keep or display the trio anywhere. This is where a normal, rational human being would hear warning bells, a red flag would be raised or some sort of alarm would sound. You are not quite at the “tipping point” that point where you are still part of the majority of humans, functioning like everyone else.  Without warning of any kind a fourth item presents itself and you think, “Who wants to be just like everyone else”? You’ve now crossed that line, the Rubicon of no return; you are a collector my son, one of the lost, the hopeless; the obsessed.

At first being obsessed is not a real problem for you or even your spouse, there is lots of room to accommodate your collection or in my case collections. It all fits well in a corner of the basement or your office/den and it keeps you occupied and it is all pretty harmless, or so it seems. As the collection grows ever larger, much like an infestation, hardly noticed for a long time, you find the little area that you have been allowed to use to amass your “stuff” is getting too confined. You and your collections are starting to feel choked, smothered almost trapped, the need for space, more space, is becoming a driving force in your life. Just when you and your collection are starting to suffer claustrophobic anxiety one of the kids is going to University. An empty space is now available and there is no need for an additional guest room and you certainly are not going to entertain the child’s moving back home. What to do. You and your spouse have joked about how to make the room unavailable in case the graduate decides to take up residence with you again until “they find themselves”; a common excuse to free-load off Mom and Dad.  The idea of filling the room to the top with concrete has been kicked around in jest, but you, you have a much better idea...

Ah, your own room, the collection room, your sanctum sanctorum a place for you and the collection. Not you and “your” collection but you and “the” collection as it has now taken on a life of its own, ever growing, ever consuming resources and that most vital of all necessities, space. Life, my friend is indeed a cycle, an ever revolving wheel of searching, acquiring followed by more searching for material to feed the collection. Just as it seems as if the very walls of the collection room are about to burst the second child announces plans of “leaving the nest”. All praise the collecting Gods, you now have a second room ready to accept the overflow that has accumulated; and so the cycle starts anew.

Oh happy days, the elation of space to fill, of territory conquered; no more stacking specimens in corners placing them in boxes for future display.  You think you are once again the master of space; oh you poor, poor deluded man.  It never fails that history repeats itself and room two, the room you now call the “Sword Room” has started to constrict you. “The Collection Room” is now the “Main Collection Room” as you feel the need for definition and while there is more in the new “Sword Room” than swords and because you have submitted to the reality that these collections have become living entities you know the rooms deserve names of their own.  “Surely this cannot go on”, is not a thought that crosses your mind, not openly that is; still there is that nagging feeling that space is once again at a premium.

Strange how as each child has announced her decision to move out, to school, to get married or to find their own place they have become your favourite child. As life would have it, the third daughter is moving and at this point no one doubted the destiny of the newly emptied space. A new problem, however, presents itself in the form of a need for a permanent photographic area and a “shipping department’ for two businesses that have taken off and are thriving. So while the third room is there it is not open to the collections in the same context as in the past and while the photo area supports the hobby it is not intended for its residency.  What to do?

After just over fifty years of collecting, the last twenty with your present wife, you have the whole downstairs (basement level) to yourself; with the exception of a guest room which has been declared “off limits” to the collection and any part thereof by the true ruler of your house. Three rooms dedicated more of less to your collections, a three piece washroom and the family room which the whole family calls “the museum lounge”; which it pretty much is. All of this and yet there is that need, the need to feed the obsession; the need for space..

The only answer seems to be a reduction of all that is excess and not required to keep the collections alive and thriving. A call to two dealer friends and an antiques “picker” is made and suddenly the Collections are leaner and perhaps improved somewhat. Gone are three car loads of mineral and fossil specimens, two dozen surplus Bobby’s helmets, and a collection of cameras, firefighting equipment and military radios. So many collectables gone but in their place is a tidy quantity of cash. This scenario may sound quite desirable however it is much like a drug addict getting clean and as a reward he is handed the keys to a pharmacy. Still there is the matter of all of those items you worked so hard to accumulate being gone, gone forever, as you realize that you won’t live long enough to ever collect them or like objects back again. You look around the empty room, a vacant place such as you have always been striving for and now have gained. In shock at what you have done, you take a deep breath and before you utter a sound you realize the horror that...

...in space no one can hear you scream.

Happy obsessing collecting.

Regards

Brian