Stuff

Sometimes what I express are perhaps original thoughts but more often than not I have read something that I find at least intriguing, and at the most potentially life changing.
Such was the case yesterday.  It was something someone said.  “life is meeting.”
The context of seeing that was an article I was reading about a private library in Paris.  It is stacked with books.  Chaos reigns.  It is spread over three stories and in places books are stacked up on the floor.  It has been operating for centuries and was a favourite haunt of such writers as Hemmingway Joyce and others.
What is truly amazing to me is the library doubles as a house.  Not just for the current owner but anyone who want a bed and feed.  The upshot is that writers and poets have stayed there and left original manuscripts.  Worthless at the time but priceless now.
The current owner defies what is considered good business practices.  He is grumpy and will not sell some stuff.  Yet the business thrives.
It is his philosophy that sets him apart.  Hospitality to strangers means more to him than the bottom line.  What he strives for is community over customers.  People rather than profits.  He has put benches outside his store and proclaims they are for anyone to enjoy the beauty of Paris.
To me in this day and age that is a seldom seen attribute.  I can imagine it being a “good news” story that one of the channels often has.
It was in that framework I read “life is meeting.”  It got me wondering how true I found that to be. 
It is really easy for me to say that people mean more than stuff because that is the way I am.  I know some have a real issue with stuff.  I do like stuff.  I do have stuff.  But I do know there is nothing man made that is permanent.  Some things I hold onto for dear life, but its presence is precarious at best.  I think of the Library at Alexandria.  The statues the Taliban blew up.  The looting of treasures in Iraq. Even the apartments in Ukraine.
Stuff has a way of slipping through my fingers no matter how tightly I hold it.  So I ask myself if lifeless stuff that has a use by date, and is best held loosely by me what is the most meaningful to me?
For me that is why “life is meeting” is significant.  All the most meaningful things to me are meetings.  Not like committee meetings but one on one perhaps unseen meetings.  Sure the acquisition of stuff means something, but it is often fleeting.  A means to an end and not an end in itself.  Time spent alone in study or reflection is valuable, but it is always done in the context of emerging.  Sharing knowledge with others, or being refreshed to share with others.
I know it is a me thing, but I do rather mix with life than innate objects.  I find innate objects assume significance to me in the light of another, or often serve best as an illustration of my environment.  People moments remain bright while stuff moments shine briefly and fade.