Losing Everything

 

Today’s guest post is written by EJ, a physician blogger who writes at Dads Dollars Debts. I reached out to him shortly after I read this post, and asked him to share his story with all of you. Enjoy!

THP

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So how does one lose all of their possessions in a single day?

 

A wildfire, that’s how.

 

On October 8th life was going along as usual. It was a nice sunny Sunday afternoon in Northern California. We had some friends over that afternoon and noticed that the wind was blowing in from the valley (the East) instead of the Ocean (the West). It was weird but nothing I paid too much attention too.

 

That evening the wind continued and I even told my wife that one of our trees was likely to be blown down. Sure enough, at 10 PM, it blew over. I personally did not think much of it other than that it was going to cost me to get an arborist in the next day to clean up the tree. The winds persisted and I could not fall asleep despite being exhausted.

 

Something just felt wrong. Off. My Spidey senses were firing. I finally ended up going downstairs and pulling in all of our outdoor patio furniture. Things had been flying all over and I figured it would be easier to clean up now instead of later.

 

Foolishly, I did not think to turn on the television and check the local news. This is one downside of being disconnected (maybe the only downside). Finally, at 1 AM I fell asleep. As I dozed off I saw a pretty glow in the distance. Over the mountains. I thought it was pretty and unique, so I snapped a photo before passing out. I had no idea what was to come.

 

Awoken

 

Suddenly I heard a bang on the door. Then another bang. My dog was barking and halfway down the stairs before I could even react. The power was out and it was pitch black. It was 2 AM.

 

I ran to the front door and as I opened it I saw two people running at me. I slammed the door and yelled at them. “WHO ARE YOU? WHAT DO YOU WANT? STAY BACK!”. They answered that there were fires all around us and we needed to go now.

 

I stepped outside and I could see the blaze, smoke, ash, and general chaos around me. It was eery because there was no one else out…at least not yet.

 

I ran upstairs, woke my wife up, and told her we have to go. She looked at me strangely (and surprisingly much more calmly). She got up, grabbed our toddler, went to the closet, and grabbed some clothes for my son. In the garage, I opened the door manually and pulled the car out. We put our son in the car while I waited outside. My wife ran in and grabbed a few things. Then she sat in the car and I went and got our wallets.

 

Escape

 

We took off down a smoke-filled, ash-ridden mountain. No lights on except for the ambulance, police, and fire trucks. In the distance, the entire mountainside was burning. My wife watched and took it in as I was focused like a laser in front of me.

 

Driving was tough with visibility barely 10 feet ahead due to all of the smoke. But we made it out and drove to a friends house 15 minutes away. Along the way, we saw a car completely on fire on the interstate. Tons of flames and just pandemonium. Surreal and unreal all at the same time.

The Next Few Days

 

The next few days were a whirlwind. We drove further south to my in-laws and tried to regroup. We realized that we had nothing. I mean nothing. None of our daily need items like clean underwear or socks. The essentials were our first thought. The loss of all our other items (books, heirlooms, photos, etc.) had not quite dawned on us and would pop their way into our memories over the next weeks to months. Causing moments of sadness and pain.

 

It is weird to one day have all of your possessions and the next day have none of them. It is different than a planned decluttering. Here there was no thought or deliberation. One day we have everything we had accumulated. The next we don’t.

 

We forgot our wedding rings and her engagement rings. No photo albums or photos. None of my son’s artwork. No books. No sentimental knick-knacks. None of it.

 

Part of the reason we did not grab anything is that we assumed we would be back. Who expects their home to burn. Surely the firefighters will contain this thing. After all, we did live in a suburban neighborhood. The other reason was that we literally did not know how much time we had. I saw flames all around us and figured we better just get the hell out of there.

 

So here we are. On October 8th we are living life normally. On October 9th we have to restart. A hard reset. My wife and I saw the opportunity to change how we lived. So now we are trying to live more purposefully.

 

Starting Over

 

On October 9th, amidst the phone calls and emails trying to figure out insurance, rentals, family life, etc. my wife and I stopped to talk. It went something like this:

 

“Wow…I mean WTF? What just happened?”, I said.

“Seriously”, she replied as we both kind of chuckled. This is quite unreal and difficult for us to grasp. We just both laughed for a while. The deep kind of chuckle that culminates from anxiety and absurdity.

“So…what now?”, I asked her.

She said, “Well you have been talking about minimalism for a few months now. Seems like a good time to try it”.

 

The truth is, we had been contemplating a radical decluttering for a few months, and taken modest steps. I had pared through my clothes. We had donated or given a way a bunch of stuff the weekend of the fire. We were taking baby steps towards simplifying our lives.

 

Now we had nothing and were in the position of adding things back. So we would be more deliberate about the possessions we purchased and brought into our home, wherever that may end up being.

 

The fire brought us forcefully to the path of minimalism..or what I prefer, moderatism!

 

Rebuilding

 

Before the fire I was contemplating taking a break from buying any new things. The fire changed everything. Not buying anything is a bit ridiculous when you own nothing. I did need some shoes, work clothes, workout clothes, etc. So in the first 3 months (October to December) after the fire, I went and purchased some of what I consider life essentials.

This included a pair of tennis shoes, flip-flops, and dress shoes. I also bought jeans, 2 polo shirts, 2 sweaters, 5 dress shirts, 2 pairs of khakis, 2 brown belts, and a jacket. These items along with some new socks, underwear, and t-shirts are all I purchased for clothing during these months.

 

As far as non-clothing items, I bought a laptop, hammer, screwdriver, measuring tape, nails, modem, and router. It was surprising how little I  needed.

 

Radical Experiment

 

Maybe buying nothing could work, even starting with very few material possessions. I figured it would be a way to permanently change my habits. Then January 2018 rolled around and The Happy Philosopher laid down his buy nothing challenge.  I figured I would publicly do the same.

 

So far it has been going okay, but if you look at my latest update you can see I have bought a lot of stuff. Mainly lots and lots of camping gear. What I have not bought are various clothes, books, and random stuff. By choosing to buy very little I have actually changed my mind’s wiring.

 

 

Consumerism is a Habit

 

Let me give you an example. I have always bitten my nails. It’s a bad habit but one that is hard to break. A few years back I decided to break this habit. I carried a nail file with me everywhere. When I started biting my nails or had the urge to bite my nails, I would just file them down. It took about 6 months of carrying around a nail file, but now I do not bite my nails.

 

Consumerism is a habit just like biting my nails. Previously, I would be bored and want to go to a store like Target and walk around. Inevitably I would buy something I did not need. Maybe a new video game or CD. A book I could have checked out from the library. The same would happen at the grocery store. I would go to buy milk and end up with a new grilling tool too. This is modern day human nature. We are primed to buy, and stores like TJ Maxx and Marshall’s are great at getting us to buy random stuff. Why else would they sell a grilling set in a clothing store?

 

Six months into this challenge and I have rewired my brain. I do not seek to rid myself of boredom. I just sit still and enjoy life. I have zero desire to go shopping or even to go into stores like Target. I am liberated and am in control.

 

Minimalism?

 

I am happy with my current level of minimalism. I have not deprived myself of all life’s possessions (that’s not the point of minimalism anyway) but am purposeful about what we bring into our lives. Even if we have bought items that turn out to be less useful than we thought, we donate or sell them.

 

My wife, while also deliberately living, keeps us more near the middle ground. Our kitchen has been replenished with the things we enjoy but arguably are not necessary. We have a griddle and a waffle maker (who needs both, but we do use both). There are various size measuring cups/spoons. These are all useful and she does use them all. She has focused on high-quality items and not a lot of them. For me, however, it is superfluous.

 

What we don’t have is things like corn on the cob holders, napkin rings, or other absolutely ridiculous things. We have asked our family members to not give us those items and respect our desires to keep the home clean and decluttered.

 

Kids

 

The area where we have accumulated the most items is for our son. He is 3 and over the course of 8 months, we have more trains and train tracks than I ever imagined. The benefit is he plays with these for hours and will arrange the tracks himself (there has to be some creative and developmental value in that). We have a ton of children’s books, though we do our fair share of borrowing from the library. Finally, he has accumulated some educational puzzles and games. Nothing extreme but a growing number of things.

 

Despite accumulating some items, we are still teaching him the value of giving. For his birthday he asked to give away 2 of his presents to people who need them. My wife (and me to a lesser extent) are doing something right raising this kid.

 

Moving day

 

I suspect at the end of the day when we have to move, I will have half a suitcase of clothing. My wife will have 2 suitcases and my son will throw his clothes in my previous half-filled suitcase. Not too shabby to be able to stuff all our clothes in 3 suitcases.

 

The kitchenware and my son’s toys/books will take the rest of the moving truck and I estimate we will have 5 boxes of kitchenware and 3 boxes of kids toys.

 

As for decorative items, we have very few. My wife picked up 3 pieces of framed art she will keep. There are some family photos (now more precious than ever), 2 candle holders, and I think 6 lamps. This is much less than our prior home and I do not suspect it will grow much.

 

Possessions…the Meaning of it All

 

What do we really need to be happy? Honestly, I think it is a stable living situation, food, and a healthy family. That is really it. The rest is just filler.

 

My wife, son, and dog made it out. For a few days, we did not know what happened to our home and where we would be living. That sucked. Then we lived in an apartment that commonly had cops on premises. Let’s just say it was not in a nice part of town. That sucked.

 

I am very appreciative of the stability my health and finances bring. I feel terrible for families growing up in dangerous neighborhoods or people living on the street. Most people would not choose to live in those conditions but are forced to by finances and opportunity. I get it and I appreciate what I have.

 

As for stuff. It really is just stuff. Some make life more convenient (like a griddle instead of a pan for my pancake and bacon breakfast). Even if the possessions bring you brief happiness it will not last. None of it is necessary. That is the reality.

 

The Future

 

As we move forward I am considering the quantity of joy to expect from an item. This will even trump cost as we can afford most things. If the item will only bring momentary joy but take up space in our house, then we will either rent or borrow it (a book for instance). If an item will bring recurrent joy then we will purchase it (all of that camping gear). By breaking down the items in terms of joy, we will make smarter and more lasting decisions on our material possessions.

 

 

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EJ’s story really got me thinking about material items and how they play a roll in our lives. It is one thing to voluntarily downsize and declutter, it is entirely another thing to be forced to through disaster, war or extreme poverty.  What do you think? How would you react to losing everything?