Left hand meet right hand. Oh, you *know* each other? Well, crap.

Back in high school/early college days, I had my room set up just the way I wanted it:

Bunk bed with a loveseat pushed up against it and comforter hanging down from the top bunk to create a cocoon-like curtained-off sleeping chamber. Sitting on the loveseat, I could access my computer (dial-up FTW), my VCR (used to hit Movie Gallery and watch a movie a night), my Nintendo (only 60 or so games at the time), the portable CD player that I bought a 50 foot cable for to hook up to the totally old school stereo system/turntable on the other side of the room. Records for the stereo. A keychain collection hanging in a long chain over the closet door, floor to doortop to doortop to floor.

The walls and ceiling were covered with posters, the bad hair day cat, my StuCo campaign posters, a Tim Johnson South Dakota campaign sign that Juliet had lovingly added the letters OTHY to, a Toy Story poster, a set of multi-colored cards describing my identity as a follower of Jesus (I would have said Christian at the time), some CD cover posters I got that summer I worked at the Christian Book and Gift store (Jesus Freak, Bloom, and later a signed Conspiracy No. 5 I got at a rare live acoustic show), a painting or two that I did living in Belarus, some witty postcards, and a bunch more that I've forgotten (but if you remember, feel free to comment).

Above the stereo, I kept a shelf full of nostalgic knick-knacks: craisens from Mackenzie, little spiky haired bottle cap guy from Mackenzie, a plastic dinosaur from Mackenzie (heck, a bunch of great white elephant stuff and birthday knick-knacks from my good friend Mackenzie who I kind of blew off about two years ago and still need to get back in touch with and apologize to), some paintballs from that time I went paintballing with the youth group (stored in a little laquer box from Belarus, two drippy candlesticks that were once lamps that I had used in my quasi-ironic shrine to Toy Story, a virgin strawberry daquiri plastic goblet filled with Frutopia caps, a Frutopia CAN, a can of Cheetoes, a marble or three, a double shot glass candle from prom, as many badges with my name on them that I could collect, my dead older brother's cap gun (with new caps I bought just for that gun), my ONHS spirit buttons, an Altoids can filled with cufflinks, and a bunch of other stuff I can't remember (but again, if you remember, feel free to comment).

That was me up there. I'm even getting a little nostalgic as I write this. That was who I was. Those things. Keychains, and the shelf of knick-knacks especially, and posters, and the computer, and the old NES games. I was the guy who didn't care if he had good stuff, as long as he had stuff he thought was cool. Especially if only he thought those things were cool.

The funny thing was that as much as all those things made my image, I had a friend tell me that of all the people he knew, I was the most likely to be able to give everything up. I was the most likely. That's scary.

Admission: I love shopping. Jill has a hard time remembering this for some reason, so it always catches her off guard when I actually need something and I go and have a long fun shopping time and get all kinds of good deals on stuff. I love walking around malls, going into every store that interests me. I love swap meets and garage sales and flea markets and Goodwill and thrift stores. Heck, I even really like grocery shopping.

The thing is, over the past few years or so I've been realizing how much I've bought into the lie that what I own is who I am. It's a big lie, too, and a lot of people believe it, even people who aren't necessarily materialistic. Maybe even especially the people who aren't materialistic. In our culture, what you don't own is as much your identity as what you do. So I've really laid off shopping. To the point that I probably could use some more clothes than I have, but it's almost an addiction to paint my identity like that, so I keep away as I can.

I was saying week before last about that walk I took at lunch how I like being seen. I like my image to be one that makes people think, makes them question their own image. Like, "Hey, that guy is X, and he's Y; I didn't know you could be both. For example, I used to try to be a "cool" Christian. I'm not sure anymore that such a thing exists. Now I'm not even sure what image I'm trying to project. I want to be the iconoclast. Also, something intelligent, probably. I like to be thought of as smart. But I want to give it up. Deepest down, I don't want an image at all besides Jesus (Try the You are the Image song here, which should also give you some insight into a recent post title), and I have no idea how to shed everything else.

But just a layer shallower than that, although I've somewhat left behind the image of the guy who only owns stuff he thinks is cool (oh but not entirely), I want the image of the guy who doesn't own very much. Or the image of the guy who owns nothing.

At the same time, I don't want to own very much. I want to live simply. I could do it so no one knew about it, I wouldn't care. If someone broke into my house and stole everything we had, I'd be sad, but I'd also be really relieved. It's even a selling point of moving to the east side: better chance to get our stuff stolen. Ha.

But not ha. I'm kind of serious. Jill and I actually talked about it and the only thing I'd really be sad about losing would be some of the data on our hard drive. Which is a good reason to start backing it up off-site, which we've started to do with our pictures (Thanks Dropbox). I'd be fine with losing the books and the games and the game systems and Nintendo games and even the laptop (I'd actualy be saddest about that, really. Almost as much as the data.) and the DVDs and the furniture. I'm cool with that. And I really want everyone to know that I'm cool with that. But I also don't want anyone to know. You know?