8/30/2008

Garage Sale

Never Again!!!
Today was the big garage sale. To better understand why this will never happen again you need to get a little understanding of our personalities. We share one thing in common ~ we both hate waste. But, we are polar opposites on how we act on this common ideal. I see that we have too much stuff. I spend at least two weeks gathering the stuff, cleaning it up, boxing everything according to use, and putting it out for others who may want/need to buy such items. That way everything is recycled and I don't have to pay the dump fee (which is really expensive here). To me this is logical, and people PAY ME to take away my unwanted items. Honey sees things very differently. He sees that we have stuff and sees no reason to dispose of said stuff unless it is so broken that it can't be fixed. (to qualify for this title ... the item MUST be stored for no less than several YEARS and then the unusable item can be thrown away). In his mind, garage sales are something one visits to buy items.

I was warned in the very beginning of this venture to leave his 'stuff' alone. And after the video tape ordeal ... I was very careful to heed the warning. I did ask permission to include two hunting bows that he can't use, but I made sure to limit most things to what was mine. What my feeble brain did not understand until it was too late was Honey didn't want to spend his day off helping me host a garage sale; especially one that took over an hour to get to. Most of the people in our area are very wealthy and aren't exactly 'garage sale' type folks. My step-daughter lives in a large town where garage sales are almost considered a sporting event, (who can get to each sale the fastest before all the good stuff is taken). She and I thought a combined garage sale at her house sounded like a wonderful 'family' event.

My first clue that this was a really bad idea came when we were loading the items in the truck. The grumbling started almost immediately; and got louder as the bed of the pickup begain to fill up. By the time we got to Claremont, neither one of us were in any condition to be around people ~ family or not. And when his hunting bows sold for much less than he thought they were worth ... well, let's just say I wasn't very popular. I do want to qualify this by saying that he made the deal with the man - not me.

All in all, I made about as much money as the load would have cost to dispose of at the dump. We still had an enormous amount of stuff that didn't sale and needed to be packed back up and brought home. This didn't please him at all! Our darling daughter came to the rescue and quite possibly prevented a divorce by offering to take the remaining 'stuff' to the Salvation Army. When Meja does decide to go to college, I'm going to recommend that she get a degree in marriage counciling.

So, for the sake of our marriage and the sanity of our children ...
Never Again!

Have a blessed weekend.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Marriage counseling Mama? Are you kidding me? Haha. I love you!