I've been thinking about Space lately.  You know the amount of Space you live in, not what's up there somewhere in the sky.  How much is too much?  How much is too little. Do we really need more space?  Do you, do I, does anyone need a mega mansion?  <!--{PS..0}--> <!--{PS..1}-->

When I was growing up the standard house was about 1000 square feet.  You can find loads of houses around this size today sitting on a lot of about 5000 square feet making the lot appear to be huge.  These were the post WWII homes our parents raised families in, and some were quite large in fact, and that amount of space although small by our standards was something they never thought anything of it.  When did it begin to change that we needed so much more space?  And the better question is, why do we need this space?

The average US family today has 1.5 children so a 2 bedroom house could work for them.  It's cheaper to buy.  It's cheaper to heat.  It's cheaper to cool.  It's a savings for the environment and our resources so shouldn't  this be satisfactory to most of us?  But it's not and why not?  Who sold us on the need to have a house of 3000 square feet?  How about the 4000+ square foot house so prevalent in the east and south?  When I see some of these houses in other areas, what I see is a lot of wasted space in design.  Large entry ways, weird landings at the upper stairways.  Wide halls, lots of nooks and crannies but bedrooms that are not particularly large, unless you talk about the Master Bedroom.  There's space.  Sometimes over 1000 square feet of space just for one room.  For an average family. 

Okay, it's nice to pretend you're a millionaire and you can when you live in a mega house.  But you have to furnish it.  Clean it.  Heat it.  Cool it.  Maintain it.  And then find you don't live in most of it.  So why do you need it?  And what happens if you have this house and find that you don't want it any longer?  You have to pair down and get rid of furniture, accessories, and junk that has filled the excess space.  Believe me that's harder to do than filling it up in the first place.

What's wrong with smaller houses or space anyway?  What's wrong with having less?  Less consumption means more cash in your pocket.  Less drain on our precious resources of water, electricity and the like.  Why has the word "cozy" turned into something that alerts the reader that the property is unbearably small.  What's wrong with cozy and small and cute and clean and neat?  What's wrong with a family living in a home of 1500 square feet?  One that they live in and can afford?

Now if you're a mega millionaire and can afford this mansion, go for it even though you won't live in most of it and are likely doing it for ego purposes.  But I'm not thinking about you in writing this.  I'm thinking about someone I know who wants to pair down and is finding out how hard it is to do.  The hardest part of this exercise?  Looking at possible new homes that are really small in comparison to their present house and trying to figure out what to keep and what to let go.  That's an exercise we could all go through. 

Just for fun, what would you keep and what would you get rid of if you were to move into a space about half of what you are living in right now?  Why? How do you feel about pairing down?