Is your house filled with too much stuff? Ours certainly is. Twenty-six years of “Conspicuous Consumerism” has taken its toll on our household. It’s a common problem. To paraphrase Thoreau, author of Walden, instead of us owning our possessions – it has gotten to the point where our possessions now own us.
Thank God for Yard Sales. They are an opportunity for us to clean out our garages, basements and attics of stuff that we no longer use. And this is the season when Yard Sales are especially common. Last year I visited a few of these sales. This year I intend to do an “inside investigation” of this subject.
On Friday and Saturday (7/29 & 7/30) the Kessler family is planning to hold “the mother of all garage sales.” We have a boat, a motorcycle, and lots of other stuff for sale. The sale runs from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. on both days. We are located at 319 Fourth St SE, which is next to Nutter Park. Look for the white picket fence and the big gray house. Call 488-3125 for details.
My wife is selling a lifetime of dresses, shoes (size six), religious books, home decorations, and miscellaneous knick knacks. The boys are contributing their no-longer-used teenage clothes, baseball equipment, pitching machine, punch/kick bag, boxing gloves, a saxophone, two trumpets, and other kid stuff. We also have golf clubs, three bicycles, a desk, an antique office chair, a dressy cowboy hat, an air compressor, a 10 gallon weed sprayer, landscape edging, men’s clothing, books (of all kinds), luggage, VHS tapes (educational and otherwise), movie DVDs, music CDs, numerous diploma frames, computer printers, monitors, and so on, and so forth.
Sorting through our stuff has been a bittersweet experience. Some things are hard to part with – and others aren’t. There is, for example, no reason why I need to have 4 nearly identical dress shirts. There is also no reason why I, as a landscaper, need to have 50 neckties.
Going through out-of-favor belongings is a time to sentimentally reflect on earlier times; it is also a reminder of how foolish a person can be with their shopping habits . . . like buying things you rarely used, and didn’t need in the first place. But that, my friends, is why Yard Sales were invented. And cleaning out the refuse of our lives is a process that we all, at one time or another, will have to do.
I hope to see you at our sale. And don’t forget to also visit the other garage sales in town. “Yard Sailing,” as some people call it, is a great way to visit with your neighbors, recycle usable items, and pick up some real bargains. It’s also a “rite of summer” that all Americans should participate in.
(Jerome Kessler is a wannabe author who is a retired physician and part-time landscaper. He is a regular contributor to this newspaper. Email him at [email protected] with your comments and questions.)
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