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Read the second article about possessions

Goodwill Industries

Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts

Maybe it was because she had such a fondness for all her first-grade students, the ones she introduced to the magic of reading and math, that she simply couldn't give up their sweet remembrances. Maybe she was reluctant to ever hold a yard sale, in case some of her students might see how little she treasured their presents. Whatever the reason, when the first-grade teacher died, she left behind an accumulation of gifts she'd received from students over her 40 years of teaching. Most of the gifts -- handkerchiefs and bubble bath and cheap perfume -- were still in their pretty little boxes.

Little boxes that filled one entire room of her house.

When I read the story in the newspaper, I had to wonder: Did she go into the room from time to time and look at the unused gifts, recalling some favorite times and students, or did she just shut the door and ignore the stacks of boxes? And seriously, hadn't she ever hear of Goodwill?

Clearly, stuff can be both a problem and a joy.

I think of that gentle teacher whenever I look around the house. "We have got to get rid of some of our junk," I'll say to Jim. The "our" is an attempt at marital harmony. I, after all, am not the one who brought to our marriage 500 old 45s, about 2,000 albums, four turntables (what if one breaks -- you can't buy them anymore!), uncounted numbers of cds, cassette tapes, reel-to-reel and video tapes, hundreds of books, four coffeemakers, 47 coffee cups and, well, you get the overstuffed picture.

Unless you count the mess it creates, I'm happy about some of Jim's stuff because it makes him happy. The music, he says, is "the sound track of my life." He listens to the music and reads some of the old books often enough to make it clear how much he loves them. It is a joy I would not have him miss, although I wouldn't miss the clutter factor.

Despite what Jim refers to as my minimalist tendencies, I'm hardly averse to getting and keeping. In fact, a great deal of the joy of possessions can be in the getting.

For to get can mean to shop. And when I go shopping, I go shopping. My female friends and I can chat and laugh and try on nice clothes and have a great lunch together and maybe spend nothing or maybe spend $200. But it's a day of bonding and a day of laughter and a day of fun. Yes, the getting is the central part of it, but the items are imbued with extra delight because of the day we spent getting them.

And getting often involves getting a deal, something that seems to send shivers of joy up just about everybody's spine.

"Look what I found!" my friend Kay will exclaim, showing off the great buys she collected after a particulary successful shopping trip, toting up the amount of money she "saved" by getting things on sale. Getting a good deal is a major part of her joy in owning something.

My father still gloats when he remembers the Royal Doulton character mug (pictured above)  he gave me one year. An inveterate yard sale shopper, he's always looking for a deal. One day, he found such a mug at a sale for all of 50 cents. Knowing that I collect them, he immediately grabbed it. He was pleased with his find; he was even more pleased when I told him such pieces usually sell for at least $40.

And owning something also can involve activities akin to a treasure hunt. Seeking the treasure is a lot of the fun. Marketing pros certainly understand this -- releasing limited copies of Beanie Babies, for instance, proved to be the best sales ploy ever.

It works on more personal levels, too. When his father died and his mother moved to an apartment, Ray, my brother-in-law, wanted one item in particular: a pair of salt and pepper shakers the family had used when he was a boy. Several months later, his niece unearthed the treasure among the dishes she'd been given. It seemed hardly a treasure. The salt and pepper shakers were plain and valueless. But to Ray, those common items had a value far beyond their financial worth. They were a fondly remembered bit of childhood meals, of a family sharing something more valuable than the food on the table.

Jim has a collection of rocks, gathered on various vacations. I have a collection of sea shells, gathered on various vacations. These treasures may not seem intrinsically valuable, but to us they're certainly worth their weight in memories.

Amid the joys, of course, come the problems.

Getting, as most people eventually learn, doesn't magically solve problems. A perfectly decorated house, a complete collection of 1957 Topps baseball cards, a signed first edition of A is for Alibi won't automatically lead to happiness. Despite how it looks on commercials, our life, health, relationships and dancing skills don't suddenly improve if we buy a pair of khakis.

You can't always get what you want, it's true, but sometimes you can't get rid of what you don't want, either. Just ask some of the board members at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York, who wanted to sell "Numbers, 1964," a painting Jasper Johns created especially for the center. The piece is valued at more than $10 million, and Lincoln center trustees says it costs more than $100,000 a year for guards and security devices to protect it. But when the performing arts center considered selling the painting to help repair some aging buildings, they faced outraged art devotees. "The sale of this painting is a disservice to artists, to art, to architecture, to the architectural professional and to the public," architect Philip Johnson told The New York Times. The center is still the proud possessor of the painting. Which leads to the obvious question: Do they own it, or does it own them?

When my friend Sue and I go on a yearly gift shopping binge in Chicago, we both have a thing for dishes. We agreed that if we had a household staff and extra storage space, we'd buy dishes for every season. There's something about that idea that sounds like royalty -- "Yes, ma'am, will it be the Sevres china or the majolica today?"

But when Sue and I drool over the dishes, common sense overtakes our desire to own. If we'd need a mini-warehouse and full staff of assistants to enjoy them, we can do without.

And anyone who moves can certainly relate to the problems of stuff: sort it, pack it, transport it, unpack it, clean it, display it, and take two aspirin in the morning.

So, as a card-carrying member of misc.consumer.frugal-living, I prefer that gifts be for experiences, not things-- a certificate to restaurant, tickets to a play, a trip to Spain. But I do have to buy a new dress to attend the play, because mine is out of style, and I need a new pair of opera glasses, and for the trip I'd like a new suitcase and hey, listen, if the play's any good and the poster looks nice, I'd like a copy of that, too. Framed, of course.

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