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 I’m being buried alive by my own junk.   I’m not a technoid or a gotta-have-it type, but somehow I’ve accumliated a small warehouse of obsolete electronic goods. 

 Remote controls that I can’t identify, that go to products I may no longer have, pile up for the day when I might get brave and throw them all out.

Tiny media cards that belong to various generations of digital cameras seem to multiply through the house, appearing at random.  Except, of course, when I need one, and then there’s none in sight.

Dead VCR’s sit silent and dusty, in case the $40 DVD player I own fails me, and in case I find wisdom in spending twice that much to fix a broken VCR.  Who the hell am I kidding?  Yet the VCR could be fixed, and therefore maybe should be fixed, but…why?

Perhaps most eerie, are the blank, faceless CRT monitors of computers long gone, that wait, disembodied and dark, to be reconnected with another machine and restored to life.  Alas, they wait in vain, as flat-panel monitors - from China - are available under $150.00.

Tangled nests of power cords, battery packs, and surge suppressors form a grotto of mysterious cables that daunt my organizational skills and therefore occupy a large box.  They lay in there, like dormant snakes, waiting for me to stick my hand in. 

For not being especially fond of technology, I wonder at my own inability to part ways with the electronic relics that haunt my home.  Maybe it’s that I hate wasting things.  This stuff still works, or might work, or could work, given some minor investigation and repair. 

Though the truth is, it can all be replaced, and in most cases it would be cheapier and easier to do so.  Yet the notion of disposable technology hasn’t taken root with me.  I’m used to electronics and gadgets costing a small fortune.  The idea of changing cell phones every year, or upgrading to the latest-and-greatest computer every new release, just doesn’t feel natural.  I still have this archaic mentality that stuff is supposed to last. 

And in my house, it does last! Whether it’s plugged in or not.