While some baby boomers are acquiring second homes, others seem to have resurrected a hippie fantasy of living with the bare minimum of possessions and going where the spirit moves us. To do extreme downsizing, you’ve got to emulate Mother Hubbard. Your cupboards have to be virtually bare.
This is not mere de-cluttering. Extreme downsizing is, like old age, not for sissies. You start by realizing that if you lived in an apartment, you wouldn’t need all that lawn and garden equipment. Then it occurs to you that in a warm climate you wouldn’t need seasonal wardrobes.
Next, you become aware that you never actually look at the pictures on the walls or the collectibles set out so artfully on the tops of the cupboards. You have proof of this when you realize that the collectibles, which require climbing a ladder to be viewed properly, have grown furry edges. How could you not have noticed?
Research can be done so quickly and efficiently online that you no longer even need a dictionary, or for that matter, a phone book. Those wall-to-wall bookshelves can be replaced by a single hand-held electronic reader. There comes a day when things you used to treasure seem less important than the time it takes to look after them.
Aevia — Consider the Source