{"id":14169,"date":"2009-03-13T22:28:14","date_gmt":"2009-03-14T04:28:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/?p=14169"},"modified":"2009-03-13T22:28:24","modified_gmt":"2009-03-14T04:28:24","slug":"the-value-of-being-a-pack-rat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2009\/03\/13\/the-value-of-being-a-pack-rat.html","title":{"rendered":"The value of being a pack rat"},"content":{"rendered":"

Here’s a very cool story about how things change value over time<\/a> — and the “trough of no value,” when an object’s perceived intrinsic worth is less than the cost (in space, convenience, money) of retaining it … at which point, people tend to throw it out.<\/p>\n

But that trough is usually temporary, as rareness and time-driven-perspective and nostalgia eventually boost those items back up.<\/p>\n

\n

My favorite example of the Trough of No Value comes from a former acquaintance whose back room had a high, narrow shelf running all the way around it, about a foot below the ceiling. Arrayed on the shelf were dozens of kids’ lunchboxes from the 1950s and ’60s. He told me that not only are such lunchboxes collectible now, but that they’re actually fairly hard to find. Time was, of course, when most every schoolkid had a little metal lunchbox (poor kids “brown-bagged it”). But the kids grew up, the school lunch program got started, and who wanted to keep old lunchboxes around? They weren’t useful any more. They weren’t worth anything. And, since they were almost all used for their intended purpose, many were damaged or worn by use (I vaguely remember owning one that was rusty and had a dent). People naturally threw them away. The “trough of no value” for lunchboxes was long and harsh. That’s why they’re not so common today as you might guess\u2014because not that many made it through the trough. (By the way, the inset photo is a corner of Allen Woodall’s Lunchbox Museum in Columbus, Georgia.)<\/p>\n

Even great treasures can go through a trough of no value, too. Consider that Vincent Van Gogh used to trade finished paintings for new tubes of paint\u2014and the art supplies merchant was doing him a favor because he took pity on him. The paintings were worthless at the time.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Which is why, of course, I never, ever throw anything away …<\/p>\n

Actually, I can attest to this from personal anecdote. I’ve been doing a fair amount of work on our years of digital photographs. As I plow through virtual stacks of hundreds of photos, I tend to find I value the old ones — Katherine as a baby or toddler, trips taken long ago, etc. — more than the recent ones. The recent ones are, well, within the bounds of memory, and I tend to keep only the ones that are artistically sound and noteworthy. The older ones, though, show things that are no longer, so that even a less well-crafted photo becomes more valuable in my eye because it’s of something I don’t now see every day.<\/p>\n

Which, again, is why I tend not to throw things away. Because I know I will, sooner or later, regret it.<\/p>\n

I fear, one of these days, Katherine is going to have quite the job going through boxes of stuff. Will she see the value in the things I’ve ferreted away? Fortunately, it’s not something that’s going to worry me all that much at the time.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

(via Stephen<\/a>)<\/p>\n

<\/small><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Here’s a very cool story about how things change value over time — and the “trough of no value,” when an object’s perceived intrinsic worth is less than the cost (in space, convenience, money) of retaining it … at which point, people tend to throw it out. But that trough is usually temporary, as rareness … Continue reading “The value of being a pack rat”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14169","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-personal"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":8661,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2005\/09\/12\/risk.html","url_meta":{"origin":14169,"position":0},"title":"Risk","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 12-Sep-05 5:43pm","format":false,"excerpt":"My mom writes: Don't know how valid this is or not, but wanted to pass along to you info from an article in the health section of the LA Times...","rel":"","context":"In "Disney\/Pixar"","block_context":{"text":"Disney\/Pixar","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/media\/franchises\/disney"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":127818,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2015\/08\/27\/great-hera-wonder-woman-violates-a-school-dress-code.html","url_meta":{"origin":14169,"position":1},"title":"Great Hera! 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