Purple Heart

Why Men Never Get Rid Of Stuff

What is it about men and the stuff they never get rid of? Truly, if the only difference between men and boys is the cost of their toys perhaps a subset of that little saying should be that another difference between men and boys is the amount of stuff that men accumulate right from the time they were boys. Truly, the things they refuse to get rid of can boggle the mind.

One good example of this is to think about a man and an object he particularly treasures. Maybe it’s a ski helmet that he used one time back when Gerald Ford was running things. He probably ended up hated skiing that day but that helmet is proof that he once skied, so expect to find it on his mantle well into his 80s. It’s kind of a badge of honor, in truth.

This helmet will probably be found by archaeologists 4 million years from now, petrified and yet still sitting in what was once the corner of a room. No man in his right mind wants to get rid of a helmet they used only once, correct? Perhaps this is because it’s a tie to a past that’s long gone and at least eight waist inches ago, but who really knows? Certainly no man does.

Another fine example of things men never get rid of is the typical black sport watch. This particular item most likely broke down when Bill Clinton was running for president back in 1992 and there’s no hope of getting it fixed. But the memories attached to the watch somehow require that the watch itself be present in order to send out all those positive vibes. At least, that’s what most men believe.

At any rate, most women who are around men in some form or another understand that the opposite sex has an inordinate love of all things arcane, obscure and memorable (to them at least). Good luck trying to get a guy to let go of something like a pair of parachute pants that were last popular when the mid-80s turned into the late 80s. Those pants aren’t going anywhere, it would seem.

Men seem to need these physical objects far more than many women do. Consider a man who grew up as a boy that played a lot of sandlot ball. This man has a cracked black helmet upon his mantle that is almost the equivalent of the Purple Heart medal. The ball hit it one day and didn’t hit him in the head, which means a lot to him, one might suppose, though it means nothing to anybody else.

This is why men tend to make the best museum curators and cultural historians. They look back at history and see nothing but an unbroken line of men, all collecting stuff. Even the pharaohs collected stuff to the ultimate degree and actually tried to take it all with them, including their living servants. Perhaps at some point in the future, an archaeologist will find a watch, a helmet and something to do with snow and scratch her head about what it all means, though any man would be able to explain it all.

Sabaton – Purple Heart