Garage Sale

Back in January, I was listening to the radio and I heard about a man from Indonesia who is raising money to build classrooms for a grade school in Banda Aceh. The kids have been meeting in tents. Their goal to build two classrooms is a whopping....$6,000. Only $6,000! I wanted to help so I got his email address through the radio station. He gave me more information--this is an informal effort, there's no aid organization involved, he just sends the money to a friend who lives in the neighborhood of this school. He'd raised $1,200 already from friends and neighbors. I had the idea that I could raise much more money than I could give myself if I held a garage sale. After all, we have a lot of crap. Wouldn't it be wonderful to turn my crap, and maybe my friends' crap, into classrooms in which kids can learn?! Here are some things my Inner Critic (I think that's a Martha Beck term) told me when I had this idea:

"You can't have a garage sale! It's too much work."
"You don't know how to have a garage sale."
"You don't have time to have a garage sale."
"No one will come to your stupid garage sale!"

But: I decided to ignore my Inner Critic do it anyway. And I decided to do it on Sunday, February 19. Here are some things my husband and friends kindly and practically put forward about having this garage sale at this time:

"Did you think of having it in spring instead?"
"What if it rains?"
"Did you advertise in the paper?" (no, I'm too cheap!)

So: I persevered and did it anyway. I advertised it in Craigslist, and my friend made signs for it on Friday night. Several friends donated stuff, but the large majority was our own, much of it removed from our storage unit on Saturday. Saturday night, I put up 8 signs around the neighborhood. (Note: I used little nails instead of a staple gun to attach the sign to the stake. When I drove the stakes into the ground, the posterboard signs ripped off the stakes. Every single one. So I had to nail them back on a second time with the stake in the ground. Let this be a lesson to you!) I also made a display on a piece of foam-core, with photos and information about the school, so people would know that it was a benefit, what the money was going toward, and hopefully be a bit freer with their greenbacks.

See, I can't remember the last time I was at a garage sale. I spend my life trying to get rid of my crap; I don't want to spend my time sifting through other people's crap. Consequently, I can't imagine going to a garage sale. I was worried no one would see the signs. I was worried no one would see the ad in Craigslist. I was worried no one would come, and if they did, no one would buy any of our crap.

How wrong I was.

First of all, we lucked out with the weather. Yes, part of me did think I was crazy back in January when I picked this date, but meantime the winter went from cold and wet to frickin' freezing but sunny and dry. Such was Sunday.

I held my sale from 9 to 5 and said in the Craiglist ad: "No early birds." (This was on a tip from the Garage Sale Queen, whose site I found on the internet.) The first arrival was at 8:15, an African-American gentleman seeking "stamps, old coins, and trains." We didn't have anything in his department. Then just before 8:30, as I'm madly running around and pricing things and my SAVIOR Alabam has just showed up to help, a kooky lady showed up with donations and lots of questions and comments: "What is this a benefit for?" "We have a black priest from somewhere in Africa and he is the cutest person you ever saw!" "Do you have any cat litter?" "Do you have any eyeglass chains?" Strangely enough, I did have an eyeglass chain for her, but no cat litter. She also tried to give MSH some dog food while he was helping her unload donations from her car. Nothin' but love for her though, it was very nice of her to donate stuff for the sale!

By 9:01, we had about six people there, including two book dealers, one of which was scanning UPCs on books and CDs with his cell phone and seeing what the used price was on Amazon.com. Until about 11:30, we were absolutely mobbed, with at least six people there at any one time, and everyone was interested in the books! This garage sale was not a hard sell. It turns out there's a subculture of people who LOVE garage sales. I knew this intellectually, but it's another thing to actually experience them pulling up to your house, jumping out of their cars and crowing, "Alright! You're the first garage sale of the year!" and "We've been waiting all winter!" and "We love garage sales!" and "You're so brave! You lucked out with the weather!" We didn't have many other sales to compete with, so I guess everyone who was itching for a garage sale pointed their Buicks and Toyotas toward Wedgwood.

They bought practically everything. They bought the bookshelf, the coffee table, the desk (two of which MSH kindly delivered in his truck,) the old vacuum cleaner, the knick-knacks, the block-printing supplies, the router without a power supply and all but three Stephen King novels. One woman bought over fifty books ("See, you have the right prices--some people who have garage sales act like they're Barnes & Noble and they're not!") They bought most of the clothes. They bought every CD except for one: Jewel's "Pieces of You." (That makes Jewel less popular than North Mississippi All-Stars, Hole, and a Dutch country singer named Ilse DeLange.) They bought the whole set of china and most of the glassware. One Korean family bought thirty dollars worth of stuff and came back a second time with their son, to show them my poster about the school. And then the mom bought my wedding shoes! One family bought all kinds of stuff, found a shoe with no mate, left their phone number so I could call them if I found the shoe. I found the shoe, called them, and they drove all the way back from Lynnwood to give me a dollar for this pair of shoes. Even my French books sold!

Two different men asked me: "Do you have any tools or fishing tackle?" And one guy straight up told me: "Your garage sale is low on tools and greasy car parts." Several other males just looked longingly into MSH's immaculately organized garage where he'd half-covered his tool peg-board with a big NOT FOR SALE sign.

As you can tell by now, I had a BALL. I loved talking with people and seeing the kooky stuff they bought. I met three neighbors I'd never met before. The neighbor who bought my hand-painted coffee table took it right home and put a statue of Buddha on it. Another neighbor brought stuff over to put in the sale. I think my favorite customer was Millie, the bank vice-president, fresh from church service in her fancy suit, who bought our old utility sink for $5 and tossed it in the back of her leather-upholstered black Mercedes! She insisted on writing a check--the only check I took all day--she lectured me that I was at risk taking cash and wearing a "cash only" sign--some weirdo could hold me up--and she insisted on helping me carry the sink to her car. I felt bad, because she was dressed so nicely but she said, "Oh GOSH I just came from church! If I don't help you after I leave you'll be sayin' 'That lady bought that sink for five dollars and made me carry it to her car!'" I wanted to say, "Lady, I should be paying YOU $5 to haul it away!" She confided her plans for the sink: She's going to plant flowers in it. Oy.

And the sale was a smashing success--we raised $539 for the school! I'm over the moon. And really, I didn't think it was as much work as the Garage Sale Queen said it would be. I was tired that night, but I can definitely see doing another someday, or helping out a friend. It was a blast! And so much crap just magically disappeared! The leftovers, which I'll donate, fit into the back of my trunk and about half the back seat--not too bad.

Happy Birthday, Manhattan Mink!