The weekend

[ellen_datlow]

Friday evening I watch The Bourne Ultimatum which I quite liked. However...Joan Allen, who in the past has been a marvelous actor, seems to have gotten a face lift since the last movie and has lost all movement in her face. What a shame.

Then I watched the rest of the first season of Dexter. Liked it a lot...if anyone talks about plot points in the comments please use a spoiler warning so that the uninitiated who intend to someday watch the show can do so in blissful ignorance.

Saturday I went with Rick Bowes to a matinee of a Paul Taylor dance concert. Lovely, charming, and light as a feather. Some amazing dancing (and yes, I've seen the terrific Chinese acrobats with the ballerinas dancing Swan Lake--and yes, they're great) with women leaping into the arms of their partners from a few feet away. Breathtaking.

Today I spent seven hours (count em) from noon to 7pm at Robert's apartment, with (at different times): Ellie Lang, Jack Womack, Gordon Van Gelder, and Rob Killheffer. Rob and Gordon took a car full of garbage bags filled with donations (mostly clothing) to Housing Works. We bagged up about ten bags of garbage (probably more), some of which we were able to take downstairs, most of which we left in the apt fo the next round of helpers to remove. Now that we have one room cleaned up a bit, Rob and Gordon, and I started organizing the audio tapes, dvds, cds, books, and video tapes, and record albums into piles. It finally looks like we've made progress. I was able to reach over to turn on the water in the kitchen sink today--not easily--and it's fine. Jack worked in the back/first room, the one I worked in the first time I was there. He found another mattress on the floor, filled with stuff. Now we can walk on the mattress to get to the rest of the room. Jack filled several bags full clothing (I think) that are to be disposed of. I took home some great blues and jazz cds and promptly tried to get rid of some of mine that I haven't listened to in ages. We all found stuff to take but are veryaware that this could be dangerous. Hell, going to Robert's to clean out the place has made an impression on all of us. Interestingly, since this has been going on, I've been hearing of more and more instances of people who suffer from this syndrome of being unable to throw anything away. Houses filled up to the attic, which cannot be opened easily because it's filled with papers and other things.
Anyway, enough. I've still got to finish my 2007 summary before I leave for Orlando Wednesday....aighhh.

Comments

[bev-vincent.livejournal.com]

My wife's uncle's apartment was the same. Stacked with stuff to the extent that we had to shimmy around stacks to move from place to place. A lot of things purchased that were never taken out of their boxes. Kitchen gadgets purchased from TV shopping networks--and he didn't have a kitchen. Books on every subject known to mankind, including advanced calculus. We ended up with the sort of home library which meant that our daughter had access to resources on anything she ever had to write a paper about.

We delivered the contents of a 24' U-haul truck to Goodwill; people were buying stuff out of the parking lot before they managed to get things into the store. We brought a second 24' truckload back with us, filled to the brim, and it was a tiny two-room apartment.

Re Dexter: I'm watching the first season on CBS, the stripped-down episodes edited for broadcast television, and loving it.

[ellen-datlow.livejournal.com]

I wonder if it's a syndrome mostly in men? I don't think I've ever heard of this happening with females. I mean my place is overcrowded, but not like that and it will NEVER be like that.


I wonder how much they've trimmed from the original episodes...

[bev-vincent.livejournal.com]

In my wife's uncle's case, he suffered a head injury as a young man that robbed him of some of his mental acuity. From the subjects of the books that he purchased but never read, we theorized that he somehow hoped to regain what he lost.

The reason for the kitchen gadgets in a kitchenless apartment defies rational explanation.


Re DexterI know that I'm hearing the phrase "motherlover" a lot, which robs the original term of some of its bite. I have seen at least one abrupt cut to commercial that was probably more of a cut to the bedroom.

[ellen-datlow.livejournal.com]

Re: Dexter--what about the grisliness?

[bev-vincent.livejournal.com]

They certainly aren't shying away from displaying the chopped up bodies, and we get to see each of Dexter's facial slices, but I don't know if there is more that has been edited out since I've never seen the original versions.

[desperance.livejournal.com]

The reason for the kitchen gadgets in a kitchenless apartment defies rational explanation.

By me, a kitchenless apartment defies rational explanation. How would you live...?

[ellen-datlow.livejournal.com]

That's easy. In a city you order in or go out to eat ;-)

[desperance.livejournal.com]

I live in a city. And cook.

Okay, I know not everyone is like me. I don't believe my friends in Taiwan know how to slice an onion; street food is so cheap and so good, they've never needed to learn. But their apartments do at least still have a rudimentary kitchen, just in case. I'm kinda boggled, at the thought of somewhere that just doesn't. (Over here, I'm not even sure it would be legal...)

[ellen-datlow.livejournal.com]

I don't think anyone said they didn't have a kitchen--just that it wasn't used.

I do eat at home, but during the week I use the toaster oven, rarely cooking a whole meal for myself. Weekends, I make myself breakfast. But I haven't had anyone over my apt to eat since I left OMNI, which is when my apt became my office. I have a full kitchen (bigger than one of my other rooms) and a kitchen table, but the table is covered in book piles (usually). When someone does come over we bring in nice cheeses, pates, and a good bread to eat in the living room.

[bev-vincent.livejournal.com]

He ate all his meals at cafeteria-style establishments, like Luby's.

[(Anonymous)]

There are women who leave behind houses packed with stuff - but it tends to be new purchases and not old magazines and dumpster trash. Back at the old Sixth Avenue Flea Market there was always some dealer who was cleaning out some suburban house that had twelve coffee tables and forty sets of dishes. But I think the equivalent to the pack rat syndrome for women is the cat ladies who have a hundred cats (think of the Grey Gardens mother and daughter in the musical last year).

Rick Bowes

[ellen-datlow.livejournal.com]

Oh right--of course!! The cat lady syndrome is indeed the equivalent!

[golaski.livejournal.com]

This from the Washington Post:

"Miller said in a telephone interview that hoarders can come from any ethnic or socioeconomic background and that hoarding is more a symptom of mental illness than an illness itself."

I recently read--in a fashion magazine--Harper's Bazaar? about hoarders who are married couples--and, in fact, the Washington Post article related a story about a couple. There were two brothers, in NYC, who are a reference point in all extreme hoarding articles--perhaps because one brother was killed when hoarded debris fell on him, and the other, blind and dependant on the now dead brother, starved to death. But it's apparently not exclusive to men.

I've read about the children of hoarders--who lived in the mess while going to school, etc.

It seems like a survival instict gone haywire. Ever spent time with someone who lived through the Depression?

[ellen-datlow.livejournal.com]

The Collyer brothers are infamous. Jack Womack wrote a story about them: "Out of Sight, Out of Mind."

[golaski.livejournal.com]

I mentioned "Out of Sight, Out of Mind" in my Robert Aickman post previous--I thought of that story as soon as you wrote about your work in the apt (and it seemed a little strange that Womack would wind up working in such an apt--or perhaps inevitable. Walking into a room you fabricated years before...). I think of that story often anyhow--it's a personal favorite. His reference to Fibber's Closet appealed greatly...

[ellen-datlow.livejournal.com]

Sorry Adam--I read that mention but forgot it was by you. Well, you haven't seen Jack's apt...although it's much better since he got married :-)

[mjlayman.livejournal.com]

It happens in women, too, but not as often. Often the reason hazmat gets involved is because it's too big a fire risk or collapse hazard. If you have piles taller than a person with little alleys through, the piles might crush a person.

[(Anonymous)]

I've pretty much only heard of it happening with women, including my mother.

I definitely have packrat tendencies. Hopefully I'll never get quite that bad.

-Joe Iriarte

[ellen-datlow.livejournal.com]

Joe,
So bad that you couldn't get into the house? We don't know where Robert slept, as both mattresses (we found a second in the front room, buried under more stuff) were inaccessible.

[(Anonymous)]

It was pretty horrific, but there were larger mental issues at play. I'll spare you the goriest details. ;)

But yeah. She had, before she lost it, a two story, 2000-square-foot or so house to herself. Sure, you could open the front door. But the single-car garage, the guest bedroom, the den, were all wall-to-wall crap, as in you couldn't see the floor, or perhaps only a small walking space. Her living room, kitchen, and bedroom all had walking paths, but every surface was pretty much covered with junk. Her bed had a clear space to sleep in, but was otherwise covered. And, as others mentioned, stuff that could never possibly be of use to her. Books on everything and anything, clearly unread. Good deals she had found in stores. And the nutritional supplements . . . ah, the nutritional supplements! When she needed money, she would take stuff she had bought and never opened and go to stores, sans receipt, and try to get refunds. Often it was stuff they no longer sold, or in obsolete packaging, but, as often as not, she could argue the refunds out of them just the same.

(Incidentally, I wouldn't post as anonymous, but I can't figure this OpenID thing out. When I try to use it, Blogger tells me I'm not a member of my blog. o_O )

-Joe Iriarte

[ellen-datlow.livejournal.com]

It sounds horrible. I'm sorry.

Don't worry about the anonymous thing, as long as you remember to sign your post :-)