On the TV show "Hoarders"

I'm completely addicted to the TV show Hoarders. I don't even have a television in my house, but I love this show. Maybe it's the inspiration to keep my own home picked up. Maybe it's the tips I can glean from the professional organizers they feature. Maybe it's the crush on Matt Paxton. Maybe it's the interest, as someone with mental illness in my own family, in watching how the families deal with their loved ones' mental illness -- there's some reassurance in seeing that for other people, too, it's impossible to always be patient and understanding and compassionate, every single day, with a sick family member. Or maybe it's just voyeurism.

But joking aside, I think it's because I see a glimpse of where I could go if I'm not careful. I tend to be wound pretty tight, and so it's only been with effort over the years that I've taught myself not to "need" a complete set of this, or a perfectly matched set of that. Or to hold on to duplicate prints of photos just in case, or back issues of magazines because someone should keep them, or antique home-movie projectors to remind me of a previous hobby, and besides they're just such nice kitschy objets on the shelf there. If I haven't given away the second copies of the photos by now, I'm never giving them away. I'm not the publisher's librarian. And the fewer conversation pieces I have on my shelf, the easier it is to dust it.

And I hate spending money, too. So why do I want to add the book by Dr. Zasio from Hoarders to my home library?