I used to have a friend with a barn full of what she called “things of purpose” – those items that you have no immediate use for but you can’t bear to throw away because they may be useful some day. Sadly that friend is no more but her saying lives on in my own shed as now I too have a good collection of “things of purpose”.
I’ve fishing-related junk, boat and sailing junk, climbing and mountaineering junk, antiques and collectibles junk, computer junk, not to mention all the bits of copper, brass and bronze plumbing bits, the hundreds of bits of teak, mahogany and oak, the pine and plywood offcuts and the dozens of old tools that one acquires and inherits over the years.
Recently though I’ve been needing extra space and had to do some harsh pruning of my “treasures”. Some things were genuinely only fit for the bin and I’ve no idea why I’ve been keeping them, so they’ve been put out for our fantastic binmen (they’ll take ANYTHING!!!) or gone to the Recycling Centre at Blandford.
Some other items which were too good to bin I’ve given away to the local church’s ‘bring and buy’ sale or to people on the Freecycle network. If you’ve never heard of Freecycle or Freegle then it’s basically a platform to people to offer items they don’t want anymore, or request items they need. No money is involved (or allowed) – you just send an email to the Freecycle website and it’s distributed to everyone who’s signed-up to Freecycle.
There are still things I’m hanging on to, things that I know will be useful one day, things that I can guarantee I’ll need the day after I’ve thrown them away – things of purpose! If I ever have need of a magneto coil for an old Johnson twin-cylinder outboard motor I know I’ve got a couple. Likewise an oak and bronze double sheave snatch block from an old yacht, a tin of calcium carbide to power an acetylene lamp, a box of tilley lamp spares and, probably most importantly, a spare bearing for the hub of a Merryweather 50 foot Wheeled Escape have all been retained as “a thing of purpose”.
I’ve also got a box of bits and pieces of totally unidentifiable junk that may or may not be useful some day. Obviously I can’t throw or give them away yet as they may turn out to be highly essential “Things of Purpose”… My shed is looking a bit emptier, although when I was the the Recycling Centre I did notice a few things in the “too good to throw away” area that looked interesting… I may just pop back and see what’s there – you never know when you’re going to need ‘a thing of purpose’. 
