Here I am at my old haunt near St. Paul, the Ramsey County Library Dunn Brothers Coffee Shop (RCLDBCS). This used to be "my library" before we moved. Years ago I read that 90% of the library's resources are used by 10% of the users, and I was definitely one of the top ten. Now I've switched counties but not habits, and I usually have 35 or so materials checked out: CDs, DVDs, and -- of course -- books. Our local library in Smallville is, however, about the size of this coffee shop. Hence, I order most everything I check out from the larger, better-stocked branches. Still, it's my library and I love it.
I LOVE IT. I love the library! One reason: I can feed my compulsive hoarding habit and it doesn't cost a thing. (Except late fines, which really don't count.) I don't have to take "just one" -- I can take as many books as I'd like. And I like to take lots. Do I read them? Silly, silly reader! Of course I read them. Most of them. Some of them. A few. Depending. But it doesn't matter, because it's free and I can just bring them back!
I love the library!
But, in this arena in my life as in many others, I am attempting to practice restraint and practicality. Frugality, of a kind. The take-just-what-you-need kind, not the make-a-bolster-out-of-a-2-liter-pop-bottle kind. The less-is-more kind, not the cook-things-in-a-box-full-of-hay kind.
Example: I went second-hand shopping this morning, and I had a list of things I needed. And I only bought what I was looking for. And I only bought clothes that I thought I would actually wear, and not ones that would sit in my closet with the price still stapled to the sleeve, until I finally faced up to my error and re-donated said items. I practiced a kind of catch-and-release philosophy with my wardrobe. But no more.
Same goes with the kitchen. Last night I threw away many, many pounds of old, dried beans that were using up valuable shelf space. I like beans, I guess. But I can't ever stir up much enthusiasm for them, much as I would like to. There's a part of me that would love to be one of those granola women who are always shopping at the co-op and making their own hair conditioner out of ripe bananas and wearing organic cotton and soaking beans over night on the counter top.
But it's time for me to face the fact that I am not like that and will not ever be like that, and I don't like brown rice, or whole wheat pasta, either, so there! What was salvageable is going to a food shelf. The rest is going back to the environment, where it will be composted and used to grow delicious, life-sustaining foods that a girl can really sink her teeth into, like patty melts or buffalo chicken wings.
The new, frugal me: pared down to the absolute essentials, with only 30 items checked out on my library card, and clothes that fit me, and a bean-free kitchen.
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