NOT KEEPING SCORE

“Thanks to modern technology, collecting stuff is stranger than ever,” writes Catherine Getches in a recent article in the Washington Post (login required). Due to the ubiquity of information going digital and the ever-increasing ability to store more of it, she reasons, our Pack Rat tendencies have gone digital, too – her husband apparently has 89 episodes of “Seinfeld” saved on their TiVo.

It’s easier than ever to amass volumes of belongings in this form because digital collections don’t take up any real physical space: one’s computer still fits snuggly into one’s laptop bag regardless of how many .gifs of salt and pepper shakers are squished into one’s Pictures folder.

And although I have my share of “security blanket” tendencies—a possible explanation for why we engage in collecting behaviors—I find that I fall completely in an opposite line of thinking:

I can’t get rid of the stuff fast enough.

I’ve always had a sentimental tinge to my belongings, another quality I believe leads to the habit of hoarding, and my parents will vouch for the large wood chest full of penpal letters, dried flowers, ID cards and ticket stubs they so graciously host whilst I sleep in the closet of my San Francisco studio apartment.

But when it comes to digital capital, I “rid” whenever I can—at times to the point of neuroticism.

I delete all email messages instantly upon reading, habitually clean out my documents folder, and am obsessive about condensing my Stickies into one master list of “To Do, Writing Ideas, Books to Read, Movies to See, Funny Things To Memorize and Repeat When I Want to Appear Funny.” I could spend hours just riffling through my iPhoto trying to delete any digital image I can’t imagine showing to my grandchildren lest I hit the ole Command+Shift+D and regret.

But there is something comforting—contradictory to the assertions in Getches article—about having less digital clutter in my life. There is actually great security in minimalism, I’ve found.

The less digital stockpiling I do, the less digital collateral I have to manage, and the more mental energy I can direct elsewhere. If I don’t own it, I don’t have to think about it.

It calls to mind a recurring dream someone once told me she’s had for years. Very simply, in the dream she has a pet—a cat, a hamster, an ewok—and she finds herself suddenly remembering she forgot to feed the pet. She spends the rest of the dream anxiety-ridden about how to get home to feed the poor thing.

This is a wonderful metaphor for the anxiety that consumes this generation: while I’m doing what I’m doing I can’t help but feel there’s something else I could be doing – in no small part triggered by our multi-tasking MTV/DVD/ADD rearing.

It is directly connected to the proliferation of the ever-expanding amount of information.

With omnipresent access to information, there is an inherent pressure to take advantage of as much of that information as possible as a way of avoiding what Alvin Toffler described as “future shock” syndrome.

This leads to a kind of Information Snowball Effect. In my own experience, it begins with a simple desire to stay current by reading the headlines of my local paper, the San Francisco Chronicle and gains momentum until I feel obligated to read the entire New York Times, Washington Post and Wall Street Journal, access the BBC and Al Jazeera, scroll through the current issues of The New Yorker, Esquire, NPR and Harper’s, and then check in with my favorite blogs, websites and media downloads.

And that’s before I even attempt to pick up an actual book.

I know what you’re thinking: this girl needs an RSS Reader – but that’s precisely it. My RSS feeds become just another overwhelming inbox for technology, another item on my “to do” list.

The concept of information overload in the digital era is not a new one. In relation to Getches article, it seems that some have just adapted their instinctual survival techniques (the “digital squirreling” if you will) to align with the infiltration of technology into every corner of our lives. “If the world is going digital, then I will hoard that which is considered valuable,” the reasoning seems to be, and that thing of value is information–in the form of .mp3, .doc, or .jpeg (one friend of Getches valued his full 40-gig iPod at $10,000).

And just as the collecting of digital stuffs grows easier, the need for consumption of digital information increases as well, and at some point the collecting of files or songs in iTunes or shows in your TiVo cue becomes a symbol for knowledge itself. And if you’ve ever seen School House Rock, you know that Knowledge is Power.

But maybe the possession of knowledge, then, becomes symbolic of something even greater. Perhaps the more expansive our scope of awareness becomes, the more tightly we must cling to something, anything to give ourselves a sense of being part of it – and by “it” I mean the world wide web, society, mass consciousness–the world.

Perhaps it’s so we don’t get lonely.

It’s comforting to think we are in some small way connected to something bigger than ourselves–a ping to the universe. We fear if we do not take hold of or participate in even a small part of our fast-paced and rapidly-changing world paradigm, then we will drown in a deluge of information and change.

Here I am. Writing a blog.

In terms of squirreling away digital nuts in an attempt to actually prove possession of something, however, I find my own method of survival amidst the torrent of information is to streamline whenever possible. If I possess less then I can create more. I like to think of myself as a lighter boat floating along on this pixilated sea. Navigation—and thus genuine participation—is easier the less baggage I stow on ship.

If collecting is a response to “the inevitable and unavoidable disorder of everyday life” as quoted in the Post article, then how can accumulating more material and thus adding to the inevitable and unavoidable disorder of my inbox possibly help? I have a hard enough time organizing my closet.

I think I’ll keep it simple. If I ever need anything, I have to trust it’s out there. Life is, after all, essentially sink or swim.