Word of the Week - 84

Vintage tools, artfully displayed.

A home fabric stash.

Word of the Week:  GOODS

Goods and Services, Dry Goods, Fred C. Dobbs in "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre" referring to his rather meager possessions as his goods.  Our stuff.  Tools of our trade, our passion, our obsession.  I am not, or not yet, one of the virtuous de-clutterers.  I militantly defend my right to as many books, pens, blank envelopes and paper goods as I can afford (important) and accommodate.  Need I even mention just how many things one can do with a piece of paper?

By my definition, goods differ from collections in their usefulness.  We may never engage on a day-to-day basis with what we collect - or we may - but goods have a purpose.  That purpose is to be used, even used up, though that is difficult when something is no longer made, can no longer be found.  Discontinuances catch us by surprise.  Such wailing, my own voice in my ears, when, without warning, Dennison stopped manufacturing those little slide-out cardboard boxes of red-bordered mailing labels or lick-and-stick gold notarial seals, for example.  It seemed Trader Joe's Chili/Mango popsicles existed for two shopping trips before vanishing like the woolly mammoth.  Fabric designs, scrapbook papers and sets of clear/cling rubber stamps have life spans like a mayfly.  Blink and you've missed them.  Try and track them down.  Just try.

Paper, envelope display at Paper Source.

Spices or goods by any other name.

I often think of those brave, sturdy and determined types who settled the American West.  I picture the trail, wagon following wagon in good weather and misery.  I see the goods that were too bulky, too heavy and of too limited a purpose being left behind.  A harpsichord is generally what I imagine.  Treasured, valuable, almost impossible to replace in the new life, but it will not feed them or keep them warm, no matter how it nourishes their souls.  I would have made a very poor pioneer.