FEARFUL WORDS
What words bring fear to your heart? Huge roller coasters? Mountain climbing? Claustrophobia? Well, the two fearful words for me are TAG SALE! I'd rather go on the highest, tipsiest roller coaster in the world rather than prepare for a tag sale.
Just the mention of having a tag sale can have the most rational person running off in another direction and yell "No tag sale for me!" Now I know there are some people who love them and even make their living by doing everything involved in tag sales. However, I couldn't afford the luxury of finding such a special soul.
I really should start with the fact that my partner is a pack rat. A major pack rat. She"ll save things that a normal person would have tossed out years ago. Little pieces of old receipts, past motor vehicle insurance cards, and pens. Hundreds of pens. I often wonder what goes through some people's minds.
As I started the preparation approximately two years ago, yes, you read that correctly, two years ago. It was a sweltering, humid day when I took my first steps to cleanliness and the removal of clutter in our den. Thankfully the air conditioner was humming away, sending a pleasant breeze in my direction. However, even with the canned air blowing on me, I swear I lost 20 pounds of water due to the struggles I had in the den.
How do you clean out a room that's so packed it's almost impossible to stand in? With great trepidation. "OK" I said to myself "one step at a time. Make that a step at a time." Transfixed, I almost let the whole fine mess overwhelm me. Then little by little, garbage bag by garbage bag, I started to sort items to be trashed, those to keep and those for a charitable agency. Needless to say this would be the most difficult part of the job.
I should tell you that the pack rat had been quite ill that summer, and perhaps I was taking advantage of her illness to plot and plan out my tag sale adventure. Suddenly there was a flaw in my plans. Pam, the pack rat, stuck her head in the den and said, "Watcha doing?" Oh no, caught in the act. I felt an immediate flush through my body. "Well" I told her, "I think it's time we had a tag sale and I'm sorting out what to keep and what's not needed anymore." After saying those dreaded words more perspiration dripped down my back. I felt like a little kid who gets caught with her hand in a cookie jar.
So there it was, out in the open. Even as I spoke those two dreaded words, tag sale, it was enough to make Pam suddenly take on a gargoyle like expression on her face and I expected the next words from her would be like the Gollum in "Lord of The Rings" ranting where her Preciousssss was. It was very frightening.
I was hoping beyond hope she wouldn't see the bags I had already filled with (you guessed it) the throwaway bags. But of course she did. Frantically she began to dig through them and was soon tossing items through the air like a juggler. Then I heard the words I had been dreading, "What's wrong with this? I've had this forever. You can't find another one like this!" Quickly the throw away bags began to get a great deal smaller. Suddenly her illness became a thing of the past and she was exorcised
A thought passed through my head, "I'll send her on an around the world cruise until I'm finished." Of course that thought was only from sheer desperation. Anyway, she would gather souvenirs from all over the world and I'd have to start a new purging of those.
After much haggling over what was to stay and what was to go, she unhappily sorted through her "cherished treasures." It took several weeks, but finally the den was finished. Surprisingly, many of the things were tossed or given to charity. One big step out of the way. However, another impacted area in the house was the basement. Whenever I had to go down there, I tried to just shut my eyes so I wouldn't have to see it. Of course that magical thinking didn't work. It was so out of control I didn't even know where to begin. I do believe if all those boxes contained housewares we could have furnished the whole apartment.
However, luck found it's way to me. My younger son and my daughter in law came from Spokane, WA to visit us. I rented a trash bin from a local vendor and away we went. Working in a relay fashion we filled up that container and with their help it was done in an unbelievable time. For this I was, and always will be, grateful beyond words.
The next step was to get all those boxes, bags, and housewares into the garage to begin tagging them. My next door neighbor, Aubrey helped remove all those cartons, carrying them to the garage. I had thought the worst part was over with. No way. The entire garage was filled with everything imaginable. What to charge, was it too much or too little? I tried to go out there every day to tag a little at a time. However, this time there was no air conditioning to cool me off. Our neighbors stopped by, amazed at the amount of items there were.
Finally. After sorting and tossing out, we placed the items on large tables and the bigger pieces of furniture on the driveway. Large florescent TAG SALE signs were put up in advantageous sites, brightly colored balloons showed the way to the sale. More friends helped getting tables for us. Thank heavens we had those friends who helped us get through the final countdown.
At last the big weekend was upon us. Although the day was beautiful it was quite chilly and we ended up scraping ice that had appeared during the night from the tables. So there we were, excited and expecting good weather after the chilliness wore off. We were blessed as the glorious sun warmed us and we had a perfect day for the sale.
Some early birds showed up, then couples. Older men came looking for tools and children were seeking out toys. Most people were terribly thrifty. So we kept a positive attitude saying, "Lots of tag sales in Torrington today, and because of the rain last week we were in competition with them." We had all kinds of other speculations as to why people weren't coming to our sale, we hoped that Sunday would be better.
Sunday, however, was a replay of Saturday, but with a little extra goodie thrown in. Rain. First it was light, then it rained heavier. Checking the sky frequently, I continued to hope for that "silver lining" and that the sun would peek out from the dark clouds. By one o'clock we began packing up leftovers and guess what? You bet, there it was, the sun. Of course it came out after everything had been stowed away and the day turned from rain to a blue sky with wispy clouds. So our visions of money in our pockets disappeard very quickly.
We were exhausted from the whole experience. I planned on giving anything left to local charities: A food bank, shelter and a library. As we went to bed Sunday night, these words were running through my head saying "Never again." No tag sales and no more being a pack rat for Pam (I wish). I formally give up tag sales and will leave it to those who are much braver than I. Did I have pleasant dreams that night? No, all I did was dream about me running down the street with a sign and balloons attached saying "TAG SALE", everything for free!