Im cheap and proud of it.

I use and re-use things carefully. It pains me in particular to waste food. The Buddhist/Catholic in me wants to find a way to airlift leftover rice and veggies to the Sudan.

Im one of those obnoxious houseguests who will walk up behind you while youre washing your dishes in your own damn sink and turn off the faucet.

Unfortunately cheap is a great word, like gay or liberal, that I cant use anymore. I have to call myself a minimalist or a Voluntary Simplist and use words like frugal and responsible instead of stingy. I dont hoard; I re-purpose. And I live in fear of being accused of not creating abundance. Thats worse than being accused of not having a sense of humor. Its actually politically correct for me to be cheap. I just cant say I am.

I am frugal and respectful of the earths resources. Im just not sure Im ready to be part of a movement. Yes. Cheapness has become an ism; a movement; a cause. Which is great because that means you can now make money off of it.

Now there are magazines like Tightwad Gazette and Simple Life. Two great publications which use a lot of trees and expend time, energy and money to reinforce what your mother always told you when she followed you round the house turning off lights and consolidating scraps of soap into nylon stockings.

I turn off lights and save soap, by the way, but I dont stop there. I also re-use Ziploc bags. I dont acquire things just because I can. I have no repugnance in using something, a car, a coat, or a cd that someone else used and valued before me. Ive gratefully accepted a piece of clothing from a girlfriend when she couldnt fit into it any more. Why would it matter that I dont have a shared history with the donor of some of my other used goodies?

Im not a pack rat but I dont throw a thing away just because Im not currently using it. What if I dump something and suddenly need it two years from now? I still cant get over the fact that my husband sold an expensive pressure cooker for two bucks at a garage sale. So what if we hadnt used it in 5 years? It was doing him no harm at all sitting quietly and dustily on a top shelf. Lo and behold I hit a Macrobiotic phase a couple of years later and there I was in a grain and bean-based lifestyle without a pressure cooker.

So, yes, I believe in recycling and re-using but Im a little bit of a hypocrite about it. I also dont like getting rid of things. It stands to reason that in order for other people to recycle I have to return some stuff to the product gene pool. I dont. The problem with this is that even if I dont acquire much any more I have a one-way upward accumulation of stuff.

This is where the Natural Law of Attrition comes in. Attrition is the yang to the yin of accumulation.

Ive never found this law in any books but I know it exists. How else to explain the disturbing fact that I cant find a favorite sweatshirt I used to have 20 years ago? I know I didnt throw it away and it didnt get ruined in the wash. So where is it? Well, ok, it was 20 years ago and Ive moved 4 times since then but it should still be here. Shouldnt it? Unless the Natural Law of Attrition fairy crept in one night and quietly took care of it.

Ive also been wondering for the last several years what happened to a particularly fabulous pair of sunglasses which really blocked out the sun. This was a period of time when I was fly-fishing (dont ask). With these glasses you could actually see the fishing line no matter how bright the day. I never lost them. One day I went looking for them and they werent there. Poof. Gone.

Because I could never bear to give these things away they just had to disappear little by little. Like dead skin cells sloughing off daily or hair quietly swirling down the drain one follicle at a time. You never see them go. Yet go they do. Swept gently and unnoticeably out of my life by the Natural Law of Attrition.