Things Waiting

A few days ago a man in Lübeck walked through the pedestrian zone and suddenly laughed out loud.

How absurd!

All those shops. Everywhere things waiting to be needed. Everywhere houses with shop windows in which things are displayed, waiting for someone to come who wants them. And all the people who are busy draping things and placing them in pretty light – and who, along with the things, are waiting for someone to come who needs them.

Behind the shops there are storage rooms where more things are waiting, and behind the storage rooms there are warehouses, warehouses of wholesalers, warehouses of transport companies, warehouses of factories; everywhere people who are busy managing things that are waiting to be needed.

Instead of doing it the other way round. Starting with someone needing something. That a person becomes aware of needing something, a jacket or a computer for example, and then making the jacket or the computer and carrying it around. You wouldn’t need all those stupid houses where stuff is just sitting and waiting around.

And the people who spend their time putting the goods in a nice light, they could focus their attention on life instead of focussing on dead things.

People who pay attention to life would be able to know by themselves what they need. But since the vast majority of people do not know what they need, some item has to be constantly held in front of their faces:
“Want?”

It costs energy to permanently seduce people to buy things. You have to constantly present things in a beautiful light and praise them. Otherwise things will clog up warehouses, storage rooms and business displays. “Everything must go!” is written in big letters on posters, because space must be made for more things waiting for someone to come who needs them.

The man laughed for a moment and continued.