Growth. Our culture seems obsessed with it. Financial growth; personal growth; spiritual growth. Whether it’s more social media followers or a shaggier Chia Pet — everyone seeks more.
And since we’re humans, it’s not enough that we crave growth — we actually feel compelled to complain when it happens. In fact, we complain about it so often that we gave it a name: growing pains. But when was the last time you heard someone mention “shrinking pains?” We humans are just as capable of shrinking as growing, but you rarely hear anyone boasting about it.
In the last decade, the closest I’ve come to experiencing anything that resembled a “growing pain” was when my supply of toilet paper and paper towels ran out simultaneously, and I replenished both in a single Costco visit. The influx of rolled paper products was too much for my tiny condo to absorb. I slipped many of the larger rolls into pillow cases and placed them beneath real pillows on the bed, like a set of faux bolsters. Smaller rolls were wedged into the ceiling, like bundled stacks of drug money — nestled between the pipes, studs, and wiring conduits via an access hole for the water shutoff valve.
After that experience, I vowed to never again undertake such unfettered growth. Which, admittedly, was a rather easy vow to keep, since shrinking is a topic with which I’m far more familiar. Whether it’s shrinking income, shrinking influence, shrinking readership, or even shrinking height. Seriously, how is it I’m 2 cm shorter than I was twenty years ago?
When my “ex” moved out last year, she took a truckload of cookbooks, clothing, kitchen gadgets, plants, knick-knacks, keepsakes and furniture with her. In stark comparison to the paper products bonanza of yore, I found myself with the opposite problem: far less stuff than places to put it.
In order to give the illusion that I didn’t live in an empty condo, I became the great disperser. I mastered the art of taking a pair of empty cardboard boxes and arranging them jauntily on a shelving unit — making it look as if such minimalism was an actual choice. Two lone candle sticks sit at opposite ends of a shelf, the space between them a shrine to the beauty of negative space. A single camera was placed on another shelf — the expanse around it inviting guests to scrutinize the device as if it were an object of art, rather than an object to make art.
Once I tackled the visible void, I concerned myself with the cavernous emptiness of that which was hidden — the numerous empty drawers, kitchen cabinets and closets that, when opened, revealed nothing beyond another yawning chasm of zilch.
So I took my modicum of stuff from its two or three carefully organized locations and spread it around the condo — some charging cables and batteries in this drawer, a backup hard drive and some thumb drives in that cupboard, and so on. A single extra roll of dental floss took possession of an entire medicine cabinet; a bathmat for the unused second shower commandeered an expansive drawer in the vanity beneath the sink; a bass guitar hangs from an otherwise barren bedroom closet clothes rod. I repeatedly combed through my belongings, until I succeeded in placing something into every nook and cranny of the condo — a new, spacious spot for everything!
The result? In spite of the fact there is demonstrably less stuff in my condo now than two years ago, I can no longer find anything. It used to be, when I needed something, I knew exactly which drawer to empty out and search through. Now, searching for something is like a scavenger hunt — sifting through clues from my memory while I ransack the condo, opening every door and drawer in a frantic search for my pliers.
Ultimately, other than the fact people are less likely to share them on a world-renowned blogging site, shrinking pains are no different than growing pains — they’re merely a side effect of change. Personally, I don’t fear growth, and I don’t fear shrinking — both are the inevitable result of living, loving, experimenting, and evolving. The one thing I do fear is remaining static. Because nothing tortures me quite like the horror of stagnation pains.
©2018 grEGORy simpson
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I know it may seem a bit like stalking, but pin-pointing the location of your photographs in Google maps is, I find, a more entertaining way of regenerating the brain cells than doing word searches or crossword puzzles. Downsizing 1 beat me, though.
I’d love to help you out, Ronnie, but I don’t remember where I was when I spotted this fellow. Odds are it was the 1000 block of some downtown Vancouver street, but I’m reasonably sure you worked that bit out on your own. Photography and aimless meandering go hand-in-hand for me. I’m basically a human Pac-Man when I’m out wandering.
I’m just going to have to return and do some aimless meandering of my own. I quite like to nip down on the bus to Glasgow and do some of that (3 hour trip for me – but it’s free for over 60s in Scotland). It’s good, but it’s not the same: no JJ Bean for a start 🙂
Yes Greg, but this isn’t “shrinking” is it?
It is more akin to another form of growth, that growth that happens when you accept that your lazy and familiar life requires a wake-up, new opportunities. That which has gone before has to be re-addressed, you have to look behind the curtain, and see the wide world waiting for you.
Cleaving to the old, familiar, comfyness is like getting fat… growing.
You’re right. Shrinking and growing are often two sides of the same coin. Something’s always gotta give in order for something else to grow. It’s why stagnation is the real enemy. Funny you should mention ‘getting fat.’ That was another form of shrinkage I undertook several years ago. It too, came with its own “shrinking pain”: excess skin! ’Twas a small price to pay for better health — and for being “dashing” again… 😉
Just sell your condo and buy something smaller. A trailer?
Actually a standard singlewide trailer is larger than my condo (though considerably less expensive), so my modest amount of stuff would only get spread thinner. Dropping down to a studio apartment would do the trick, but I’m holding out hope that my 1 in 2.86 billion chance of finding a girlfriend (as calculated in “The Girlfriend Theorem”) will one day bear fruit.
Hm, that one – in my country it’s called domek holenderski. I thought rather about something that can be hauled by a car or even better: a camper truck.
You see, by keeping your condo you narrow the target group to property fans (OK, your chances are lessened by 0,0…01) and while you are of the raw-food-age maybe you have bigger chances (again, by 0,0…01) to find a girl (you see!) who wants to leave after 30 years her 9-to-5 job and finally start travelling (unspoken assumption: healthy food=starting to live=travelling). On the other hand you seem to be a city beast. No easy way out here.
No excess of items = more room for ghosts to roam around in. This is what I tell my visitors when they notice I have rooms that contain carpet, curtains and not much else.
Rob: I would welcome the opportunity to dabble in a bit of spirit photography! Unfortunately, dwellings within steel & glass skyscrapers tend to be a tough sell to the apparition community.