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“There must be more to life than having everything.” – Maurice Sendak. In the short story “On Dumpster Diving” by Lars Eighner, the author explains the time he spent homeless and scavenging through dumpsters. The time he spent going through other people’s trash taught him a valuable lesson on materialism. He realized most people are in a “rat race” for things that have no real value to them. In the story, “My Wood” by E.M. Forster, the author narrates the first piece of land he bought. He did not seem to be very taken by it. He describes owning property as making him feel heavy, making him feel it ought to be larger, and making him feel as though he ought to do something to his property. Both “On Dumpster Diving” and “My Wood” seem to have the same views on property, that it is almost valueless. In Lars Eighner’s story, he tells of teaching people how to “dumpster dive”. However, they had a few problems with discerning what was really valuable and what was worthless to them. “All the dumpster divers I have known come to the point of trying t