Garage Sales A Great Way To Buy ‘Stuff’
It’s a normal weekend in America. There are the usual background sounds of coupons being clipped, ads being shuffled and lists being made. The last shower has been taken, the last bowl of cereal downed. Soon the odyssey will begin.
Garage doors will open, engines will fire. The weekend fleet will roll out on the road. In rigs, trucks and minivans we will go in search of what drives us forward: stuff.
Everybody has a different notion of what constitutes good stuff.
Tools, clothes, toys, food and furniture are the basic good stuff groups. There are about a zillion variations of these, and hundreds of subcategories of the variations. So a toy becomes a doll becomes a Barbie becomes a dentist. Presumably, the root canal patient that makes live-action noises is sold separately.
Some people want only new stuff and they demand to pay full price. They trade in their cars every two years, build custom homes and furnish them with reproductions of old stuff. To them, garage sales are the social equivalent of a burp; a relief for the masses, but you won’t catch them doing it.
Other folks want new stuff but only at a discount.
They read ads like astrological charts, searching for their destiny. Logic does not always prevail. Some will drive across town, expending mass quantities of gasoline and patience, to save a dollar on cat litter.
Others will buy some essential food item like canned brussels sprouts in bulk supply simply because the price is unbelievably low. These items will show up in Christmas gift baskets for the next five years. Friends and family will not be amused.
Another group of folks just has to have old stuff. Antique, vintage, collectible stuff. They haunt flea markets and garage sales. The classifieds are their treasure maps. They often end up with lots of tiny things that have to be dusted.
Stuff. We drive around all day looking for it. We get angry waiting in line to pay for it. We want a rain check to get more of it. When we haul it home, we have to make room for it. If there isn’t enough room, we take the next step. We demote some of our good stuff to marginal.
Demotion is a painful process in most households. That’s why everyone has at least three pairs of outgrown pants, five cans of partially used paint and 10 years worth of old bank statements in the basement.
The basement, closet, garage, or shed is the home of marginal stuff. Marginal stuff is like an old lover; we don’t want it but we don’t want anyone else to have it either. So we move it around, stack it up, put it in boxes and forget about it. That is, until we accumulate so much new good stuff that some of our old good stuff has to be demoted to marginal. The formerly marginal then becomes junk.
In the old days, people used to donate junk. Now, they sell it. Selling our junk requires hours of careful planning and execution. Do we really want to give up that Perry Como album? And how about that old lamp? Why, it’s practically an antique. That can’t go for less than twenty bucks. Maybe even twenty-five.
It’s all so hard. But if we stick with it, the outcome is inevitable: people looking for stuff will actually give us money for junk. It’s a win-win situation. Now we have room for even more stuff.
Of course, some would say that we already have way too much stuff.
That’s what the whole simplicity movement is all about: pare down, cut back, simplify.
The amazing thing about simplicity is that there is so much information available on how to get it. Books, tapes, videos. Probably a meditation mat wouldn’t hurt. And cotton clothes are a must-have. Candles are always good to set a mood.
You know, simple stuff.
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The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Kathleen Corkery Spencer The Spokesman-Review