Am I a hoarder?

It’s a funny question, but I’m also serious. My wife has called me a hoarder; heck, I’ve called myself one.

But is it true?

It’s not a straightforward question. For one thing, I’m broke. I have a fairly new, small business and I also handle the before and after-school child care for my daughter. My workday is short and I don’t make a ton of money. So, any time I can get materials for free, I grab them. Here’s my collection sheet goods, pulled almost entirely from the trash:

And I’ve got a few dumpsters that I check regularly. I’m especially greedy for metals. When it comes to steel, copper, brass, and aluminum, I’ll take home any old scrap I find. I’ve built up quite a little collection.

This isn’t even half of it.

Of course, I’m worse with tools. Yes, I restore them and use them, and occasionally sell them, but if I see a cheap and good tool, I just buy it. I often think that I’m saving old tools from the rust pile. If it weren’t for me, these useful antiques could end up nailed to the wall of a TGIFriday’s, for god’s sake. I cannot let that happen.  But I also own more tools that I can use.

I call this the “boneyard.” These are the planes that I don’t use. In theory, they’re waiting for restoration, but I have a full set of bench planes for my day-to-day woodworking, so what exactly am I doing with these? Oh, and you should have seen the boneyard before I organized it on this little shelf…which also came out of the trash. 

I genuinely do have a good eye for useful stuff. I often start a project thinking that I need something and I look around and find out I’ve already got it. Many of you are probably familiar with the Real Lathe that I’m building.  Want to know how much I’ve spent on this thing so far? $17.00. Seriously, that’s it. I had to buy the pipe, but I had everything else sitting on the shelf. Even the bearings came out of the dumpster.

And look, I also just love junk. I love things that are old, rusty, tarnished, and potentially useful. I buy things when I don’t even know what they are as long as they look cool.  I like being surrounded by worn and used things. It makes me feel warm.

But then, there’s also a slightly darker side. Sometimes, when I have the opportunity to get something good, I get this panicky feeling in my gut. I have to have it. I have to haggle, scrounge, jump into dumpsters, and drive long distances to get the—thing, the whatever. And then when I have it home, I feel a great sense of calm and peace just knowing if that it’s there, waiting to be used. My little empire of stuff is like a foundation under me. It supports my business, supports my family, and makes me feel rich in a strange, sideways kind of way. 

And that would be wonderful if there were any end to it. I’d be a happy man if my foundation of stuff was ever complete. And that’s what worries me.