i am drowning in Stuff

Why do (some of us) seem to hang on to so much? I know that at least part of my reasoning is that if i hang on to THINGS i can hang on to the feelings or memories attached to them, but is that really true?

Now i am living in a two bedroom house with a basement full of boxes (boxes that have seemed to follow me year after year, move after move, state after state, some never being unpacked) that i am Trying to sort through and it is going SO slowly. I try to hit it when i am in a "throwing out" kind of mood"

My biggest problem--perhaps not surprisingly is books (check out my library--and those are just the unpacked items!)--first of all i worked too many years in bookstores--secondly i know how quickly things go out of print and feel that i need to snatch books up before they go out of print~tho with the Internet that is not so much of a problem. I do have a problem with a book addiction~you Would think a librarian would be a little better about checking things out, and often i do--but then some things i just feel i MUST own plus there are those i have yet to read so how do i know if i'll need them or not?

When i unpack a box of stuff that's not books sometimes its almost like Christmas (sometimes not) because some of the STUFF has been packed away so long i've forgotten i owned it--and then there are those things i've bought twice, or thrice...

My mom says she's a pack rat because she was a depression baby--so what's my excuse?