All the King's Men, Streets of Laredo and The Sisters Brothers

Day 292: All the King's Men, Streets of Laredo and The Sisters Brothers
I have started filling in everything I eat and all my cardio exercise in "My Fitness Tracker," as I do every year around this time. As usual, I gained a few pounds over the holidays. My Fitness Tracker counts calories for me, telling me how much I can eat for the rest of the day if I wish to maintain or lose weight. It also gives me a happy message if I'm choosing high fiber foods, or a warning if I'm consuming too many polyunsaturated fats. I've found that just raising my consciousness about everything I put in my mouth is enough to bring my size back to modal.

As I was making the breakfast entries this morning, I started imagining a similar app for stuff. "My Stuff Tracker," perhaps. In it, you could record everything you acquire (purchases, gifts, inheritances, found objects) and everything you get rid of (donations, gifts, garage pail). You could record the purpose, the dollar cost, the environmental cost, the social cost, the sentimental value and so on for each object. "Belonged to grandmother." "Handmade by daughter in fourth grade." "Built by slaves in underground factory." "Released 12 pounds of carbon emissions." "Likely to be ridiculed within two years." I wonder if such an app would keep your acquisitions down, just like My Fitness Tracker does for your waistline.

I was also thinking about how excruciatingly modern all this is. An app to keep your weight down? An app to keep the clutter away? These are two problems that would have been unimaginable a hundred years ago. Too much stuff! Too much food! Impossible!

At the same time, I was looking around our first floor - (the open floor plan! another modern construct) - and flirting with the idea of getting rid of virtually all of my books. The first floor still looks pretty cluttered to me. There's a guy in Ann Arbor who has a little business inventorying and selling personal libraries. I could get rid of all my books, and in exchange get a complete inventory and an occasion check. I realize that much of what I value in owning the books is a reminder of what I've read. With an inventory, I wouldn't need the actual physical object. And what if I got rid of all the bookshelves? More room to move about the room, more room to push back the dining room chairs. Less to distract the eye. Imagine how much visual serenity I'd have.

And finally, amidst all these problem-solving, decluttering, inventing, judging, improving thoughts, I was noticing the problem-solving, decluttering, inventing, judging, improving thoughts. Imagining what it might feel like simply to be satisfied with first floor, and the amount of stuff I have, and the apps on my iPhones, without scheming for anything better.

For now, All the King's Men, Streets of Laredo and The Sisters Brothers are going.