It's an interesting project that forces you to think about the most important material possessions in your life from sentimental and practical standpoints.
Project created by Foster Huntington.
my dads guitar Little backstory, my dad died when i was 6 off cancer, he was an aspiring musician and left all of his gear behind, my mom sold most of it, but his expensive (and pretty old now) guitar was given to me, not only does it have a kickass sound, but it is one of the only Things i have left of him
My wife and I have had to move around a lot for most of our marriage. As we moved we ended up leaving behind some items of great sentimental value to my wife. As I realized the pain this caused her, one christmas I made her a chest with a note inside that promised no matter where we went or what happened anything in this chest would come with us no matter what. I would grab that chest.
My house actually did burn down! My family and I took nothing, here is the story: I have two younger brothers, who happen to be twins, they are 4 years younger than I am. We rode the same bus to school because we lived in a small town. So one morning we're all waking up and getting ready. Normal school stuff. Eat Breakfast, brush teeth, and wait anxiously as those last remaining minutes of freedom are stripped from you as the bus looms closer. I was finished with my morning routine and sitting in the living room watching cartoons, my brothers were both sitting with me. Altogether nothing felt out of the ordinary. Then a giant black plume of smoke came from our hallway and entered the living room. My brother and I were relatively calm, because we really didn't know what it was. My mom started screaming for all of us to get out of the house. Before she left, she called 911 on our phone. We all sat there in my mom's SUV and waited for the fire department to arrive. I felt helpless. I don't even know how helpless one can feel. But I felt something close to it that day. We had to watch as our schoolmates went by in the yellow bus, and speculate as to what they must be thinking. In the following weeks stayed in a hotel room (6 of us in a two bed hotel!). It was stressful, and painful. One day, my parents took us all to this big warehouse. It was massive, a woman took us around and showed us all of our damaged goods. This part hit me particularly hard. Looking at all of your stuff, but unable to keep it. Unable to salvage it. It was painful. I remember specifically asking if there was anyway I could have my guitar, and the lady there said it was likely destroyed beyond repair. We later found out that the reason for the fire was that one of my brothers was playing with matches, he thought one he lit had gone out and threw it in the trash in his closet. From there all of my brother's clothes caught fire. That allowed the fire to spread through their room and eventually the whole house. (A side note: I've NEVER blamed my brother, he made a mistake, while it was a big mistake nobody got hurt and I'm happy for that.) A few weeks ago I was at my parent's house and having some snacks and chit chatting. My dad walked in with a black case. It was my guitar from the fire. The emotions from that event were, to say the least, powerful. I opened it and saw my "punk rock" scratchings and stickers on it, my poorly done paint job on the pick guard, and old strings. It was just a crappy little Ibenez , but having it back, even if I weren't going to play it, meant the world to me. I said in the beginning that we didn't take anything away from the fire, and that is true. We didn't have time to take physical objects. What I've learned though is that we took our family values, we took a look at what was important to us. The stuff, even pictures and memories, while they meant a lot, meant very little in the scheme of things. Now, as an adult, I am very unattached to stuff. If I lost my laptop, my tv, my couch, or even my books which I care about deeply, I know for a fact that I would not miss them on iota. If I were to be robbed, I don't think I'd care. The best things in life are those that cannot be bought, that cannot be destroyed and that you can share with others.
These kinds of exercises remind me of how little I'd truly miss if my house was burning down. Honestly the only thing I'd really want to take is my laptop. And that's just because I really busted my ass off paying for it. Not a single dime was spent on that laptop that wasn't my own. Took a two hour commute to my job and back and worked 15 hours a day for it. I earned that thing, like hell some flames are gonna steal it from me. Everything else I own is less expensive. Hell, even my journal is on my computer, so that's that. All of my photos are backed up. Same with my music. Videogames are unimportant in the grand scheme of things. I suppose my wallet, but I haven't carried cash since I got a debit card. So yeah. My laptop and my wallet. I'm not a sentimental person.
All the animals hopefully. If I ever get around to backing shit up, I'd only have to grab one hard drive. Currently I'd have to grab ~5 hard drives and my laptop. I'd also probably go for a bunch of sentimental stuff I conveniently keep in one box, and all my cameras I conveniently keep in another box, and all my photo negatives that I inconveniently keep in a different place. That's all ideally what I'd do. In actuality I don't think I'd be very calm if the house were on fire. I'd probably panic, grab some stupid shit, and then regret not thinking to save the poor cat for the rest of my life.
Awesome that your post led me here, I hadn't thought of that post/song/idea in a good long while. based on this post: Your House Is Burning Down, You Can Grab One Thing -an oldie.
This looks fun. Lets see... I'd first grab my backpack. Easy, since it's right where I usually sit. Stuff that goes in backpack: laptop, 3DS, charging cables for both, maybe an external hard drive or two if they are near by (sometimes they are, sometimes they aren't). My headphones (just put them on real quick). Grab my iPod, phone, wallet, and keys (things I bring with me everywhere). The only other things I'd want to save are just rare collectible stuff (though no reason to risk my life). Limited edition posters, collectible figures, my expensive desktop computer, etc. I don't have any sentimental things. I really just kind of left my past behind me. It just kind of bites me in the ass every time it comes up. So I try to avoid bringing it up. But yea, so basically: dailies (including the stuff that goes in my bag), and that's pretty much it. Maybe some external drives if I can grab them in time. Everything important is on my laptop or in my backpack.
My cat, my work laptop and my disk array. Boots, wallet and coat. Most of my books I could get pdfs of from libgen or find in a library, but there are some small press horror books and old industrial and noise music zines that would be hard to replace, I'd grab as many of those as I could. I should probably scan them just in case, but scanning books is much more work than ripping albums.
My phone. My laptop. My external back up hard drives. My MacBook charger (bc fuck $80 for a new one). My blankey. My favorite pair or rockstar boots. My comic book posters. In that order. Everything else can be easily replaced.
I actually had to do this when I moved back from Maine. 75lb of whatever I could carry I miss my favorite comforter that they no longer make and some books. I miss a couple cute scarves. I miss keeping one winter jacket because it's nice to have one. Everything else I don't miss. Besides furniture, I still only have about 75lbs of stuff, although my book collection is slowly coming back.
Cellphone, wallet, ipod, keys, laptop, records, backpack (full of classwork/notes), my folder of important shit, and if I could manage it my (small) record collection.