You’re driving around in the dark on a Spring morning, studying the street corners, scrutinizing the home-made advertisement signs stuck in the lawns and plastered to the poles to ascertain their freshness. Were they put up today or last week? There appears to be no one else around and you ask yourself; “What’s wrong with this neighborhood? The paper said “City-Wide Garage Sales Starting at 7 a.m.” don’t they know that means we are going to be ready at 6?” You become temporarily frustrated and mentally discouraged. “I think this is going to be a dud, I should have gone to Lincoln.”
All of a sudden; there it is! The first garage sale of the weekend. Not only is it the first to open on this Friday morning, but you are the first customer to “sale” in! You slow your car down and do a quick visual sweep to make sure it’s worth stopping for. Is it worth missing what might be down the road where the competitiion is first arriving ahead of you? You decide; “Yes!” your heart is already beating like that of an Olympic athlete, you take a quick swig of your gas station coffee, and you begin to feel that sense of relief because you’re confident your garage-sale-jones will soon be satisfied.
You are out of your vehicle before you even turn off the engine and your second step launches you into a dead run. You’re there and the game plan you formed as you turned off the car is under way. You’ve decided to stick with the old standby of “left to right” so you start on the west end of the driveway. It’s a nice, established neighborhood, the proprietor appears to be in her 70s and she informs you that she has to get rid of this stuff she’s been hanging on to for the past 50 years because she’s moving to a condo closer to the doctor’s offices and such. (It’s these words that make a garage sale junkie experience their peak as far as anticipatory rush goes!) “Oh happy day!” you say to yourself, then you remind yourself to calm down…don’t give her any leverage, don’t give her anything to bargain with, breathe, relax, focus….focus.
“Junk…junk….got that….junk…..trash….has-potential-but-would-cost-too-much-to-fix….junk….why did I stop here?….I thkink I made a horrible mistake….I’ll bet I’m missing a great bargain on the next street over….oh my gosh! I can’t believe she only marked that priceless jug at 25 cents! Is it reallly what I think it is” You turn it over with the practiced hands of a novice antique dealer and notice the mark that matches the one in your reference catalog. “It is! Calm down, calm down, don’t let on, take it up there and give that woman a quarter before she realizes she just gave away a $550.00 dollar collectible for practically nothing.”
You’re back in the car, you carefully lay your “treasure” next to you on the empty passenger seat and quickly start the engine with shaking hands. “I can not believe it! Such good fortune, and on my first stop! It’s almost like stealing but legal!”
It’s 0610 and you are off to the next adventure of your morning of, what I like to call: “Sale-ing”. The sun is starting to add to the light of your headlights, the adrenaline from your first find is still there but you must keep looking to the next sale. You’ve got to put it behind you for now and concentrate. You’ve probably got 20-30 stops all mapped out so you finish before 10 am. Every seasoned sale-er knows that everything will be completely picked over by that time.
I can personlly enjoy a good day of garage sales myself. I’ve felt that high-like buzz and I can vouch or confess that it is definitely addictive. If it weren’t for the generosity of other’s in their drive-ways and at their auctions, I wouldn’t have been able to furnish my house. Almost everything at my place is “gently used” including the water softener, the fridge, and even the windows. I cherish a book more if I know many others have read it and it’s always an added bonus if there’s anonomously hand-written notes in the margins.
When I first moved back, I went to so many auctions and had my parents bidding on other things I needed at simultaneous auctions, it seemed like that was our weekend kjob. We all know that it’s not so much the kill but the hunt that we crave…so I shouldn’t really classify this type of shopping as a job….it’s more of a sport.
There’s just something about that rhythm of the auctioneer and that moment when Mr. Martindale says; “Sold to the young lady, number 56!” Or whatever number but it was ME he was pointing at! I always feel like I’m on the Price Is Right or something. Brad Martindale himself even delivered a stove that I had “won” at one of his auctions. Not only to my door, but up my steep, cement steps and right into the perfect spot next to my sofa of course. Now that’s service! You pay extra for that when you buy something new and instead of feeling like you’ve won something, you feel like you’re getting swindled somehow. Isn’t that the truth?
It may not be a favorite pass time of yours and even if you don’t necessarily “need” anything, you should go “Garage Sale-ing” one morning with a friend or spend a day at an auction. It’s inexpensive entertainment and everyone knows there isn’t anything you can’t find cheaper at a garage sale if you look hard enough.
—North Bend Eagle 8 May 2007