I saved my neighbour’s bacon recently, or at least serendipity did. Paddling pool weather had broken out and big promises were made to excited children. But the paddling pool was pumpless. Ashen-faced, he arrived at the door to look for a loan of ours.
The universe of stuff was smiling on us. A few hours earlier, during a rare clear-out, a plug-in pump had turned up in a wardrobe. The day was saved.
If we’re lucky, our homes are full of these magical things: utterly redundant for 364 days of the year but vital for one or two moments.
Australian illustrator Brenna Quinlan put it brilliantly recently on Instagram when she mused about the joy of stuff that is also an emotional drain, the moving of it, storing of it, cleaning it. Why, she asked, are our happiest memories made when we’re free of it?
In de-growth economies, we need a rethink of how we spend. The algorithms hear a whisper of a camping trip and drop beguiling ads for must-have sleep mats into our feed. We swipe to buy. Another shipping container sets sail and more Arctic ice melts.
Our yearning to own is easily triggered. Anthropology and psychology students must be studying the Land of Middle Aisle, where our hunter-gatherer brains get a dopamine hit to spice up the boredom of the grocery shop.
But consuming less doesn’t have to mean having less. Community sharing schemes can give us access to swathes of stuff, assets that would otherwise sit stranded in cobwebbed corners. Many of us created these networks during lockdowns when neighbours and friends became the source of things. I have a virtual tool shed now because I know my friend D has a long-handled loppers and that A has a reliably sharp saw.
So far, so privileged. But how do you tap into a sharing circle without an existing network? That's where Libraries of Things come in. Dublin had one for a while thanks to the great people at WeShare and the Dublin Food Co-op. The Toronto Tool Library, torontotoollibrary.com, is a great example. A $55 yearly subscription gets you a serious array of power tools, with staff who organise their lending and maintenance. Camping gear, mitre saws, the stuff that we spend time and money accumulating and then tripping over, could all be ours for just the time we need them and then someone else's storage and maintenance responsibility when we don't. Float the idea by your favourite WhatsApp group, friends or school-gate gang. A web of Libraries of Things could help us all get more space, time, money and connection. And less could become more.
Catherine Cleary is co-founder of Pocket Forests
