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Searching for Novelties

August 2019

My collecting has become a bit selective. My eyes are searching for novelties. Items that will add some newness to the collection and some freshness to my life. Like that irresistible shiny lens on the sidewalk. A lonely and dark lens that used to belong to a pair of sunglasses. It’s actually quite upsetting that the collection didn’t contain a lens until now. Another new finding is a metal object that I encountered last week. It is mint colored and used to be a bicycle bell. I really desired that broken bicycle bell. It revealed itself on a lawn in a nearby cemetery. I assumed it had to be highly coveted. Definitely a must-have.


We want the latest. Full stop.


Every item I choose to pick up is from that point and onwards my responsibility. And if I may say so, that is a huge fucking responsibility to have.

A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away material was extracted. Material was extracted, carried, sold and eventually shipped. Someone – even more far away – planned and ordered a specific product, regardless of whether there was a need or not. Ideas and material hovered around in space, now and then they bumped into a desire for wealth. Products were manufactured. Packed and shipped. Sold and bought. Used and tossed away. Some items even got lost and are still floating around in some state. All available.

Timothy Morton put it like this: A styrofoam cup isn't just for coffee, it's for slowly being digested by soil bacteria for five hundred years. A nuclear device isn't just for your enemy. It's for beings 24,000 years from now. 1

Things have a tendency to tease around. An expired coin doesn’t disappear just because I throw it in the trash can. At the moment my collection contains 287 items. They reside in two pretty small boxes. But then what? My collection will with certainty outlast me.

If you want to live forever: become a thing (probably possible in a near future).

But not even things last forever.


We want the latest. Full stop.


I am meditating on a recent finding: item 00278. A black rubber thingy (BRT).

The black rubber thingy fits perfect in my hand. Flexible and soft. Both sides are striped but the stripes on one side have a completely different structure than the other side. Thin incisions are carefully positioned opposite rougher stripes. The edges are soft but still fairly sharp. What type of product has BRT once been a part of? Are parts of the rubber once extracted from Hevea brasiliensis? Does BRT contains sulfur? Small items can be mysterious. They contain multitudes. BRT smells actually pretty good but my hands get a little dirty after touching it for a while. I put BRT away and instead I dedicate a thought to Hevea brasiliensis. This is the tree from which latex is extracted, which in turn is used in the manufacture of natural rubber. Natural rubber is considered a natural plastic (isoprene). Compulsively, I have to check out what the tree looks like. One google search later I can tell that Hevea brasiliensis seems to be a noble tree. I can only imagine its majestic expression in reality. The same majestic expression that is also inherent in BRT.


Natural plastic. Full stop.


BRT is probably the closest I will ever be to a real Hevea brasiliensis. But, presumably BRT is made of synthetic rubber. In that case BRT might be produced by mixing soapsuds butadiene (a by-product of oil refining) and styrene (which also might be a by-product of oil refining). I can't help but wonder what plants or marine animals contributed to this particular little oil spill.


The little things
in life
often turn out
to be the most
valuable.


Yesterday I threw an old key in the trash can. It’s still there although I imagine that it’s gone. Yesterday I also failed to go to bed in a reasonable time, which I suffer for today. Nor did I send that planned message to a friend. Instead, I was to occupied organizing my belongings and writing about a black rubber thingy.

Managing belongings take up...........................
.............................................................................................................................................................................................................................unreasonable...........................................................................................................................................................................................................................amount of time and energy.

At the time of writing, I hear a voice outside my window: the fewer things you own, the happier you become.


But we want the latest.
Just this iPhone then I am fulfilled.
Full stop.


Oops, an error occurred.
Is happiness real?


While traveling, collecting is usually more about location than the specific item. I mean, what am I supposed to do with souvenirs? The last souvenir I actually bought was a mug in Coney Island. I have no idea where this yellow mug is today but I can still find my Coney Island memories with ease. With a lot of souvenirs standing on my shelves, I am constantly interrupted by shifting memories and feelings. Always when I least expect it, usually when I least need it.

Anthropologist Daniel Miller writes: Commodities are not inherently good or bad, but you can't have their benefits without entailing the risk that they will oppress you.2

Things absolutely have the capacity to enrich our lives and understanding, but it's not always like that. What we can not assimilate might oppress us. If we try to relate to too many things, but without any deep relationship to them, we can be largely indifferent to the world and our s(h)elves.


We want the latest. Full stop.


The black rubber thingy is probably the closest I will ever be to a real Hevea brasiliensis. Even though my rubber thingy most certainly is made from synthetic rubber it made me approach a tree.

Things can never be empty matter. And things make us just as much as we make thing, as Daniel Miller also put it.

Stuff, my stuff, come along with me and I will soon be a master of stuff.



1. Timothy Morton: Being Ecological, New Orleans: Pelican Publishing, 2018
2. Daniel Miller: Stuff, Cambridge/Malden: Polity Press, 2009

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