We finally had the garage sale this weekend. It was the pinnacle of my week, in the way that I spent most every evening of last week preparing for this thing to happen, packing stuff, sorting the keepers from the crap, making the most beautiful pink and black garage sale signs you've ever seen, pricing every last thing, and dragging it outside, only to finally be able to sit and watch strangers dig through my stuff and ask random questions about it.
Garage sales are weird. I'm not sure that I'm a fan of having them, or of going to them, even. First of all, we stayed up until 1 a.m. the night before getting ready, and then got up at 5:30 a.m. because I was convinced that people would be beating down our door at 7 a.m. (I was wrong. First customer arrived at 7:45.) Me on four and a half hours of sleep? That's just wrong. Me at 5:30 in the morning? Double wrong, as evidenced by the fact that Brad and I got into one of those pointless, silly fights at 6:15 a.m. where I undoubtedly said something bitchy for no reason and then couldn't remember why I was mad. Second, there's something vulnerable about putting all of your junk out on tables in the early morning sun - all the randomness and not-worth-a-dime-ness and why-the-hell-would-anyone-own-this-in-the-first-place-ness just feels too personal. Third, there's the talking to strange strangers thing. I've never been a fan of that.
There were some moments that I was glad to be out there - I got to see what my neighborhood looks like at 7 in the morning, all the walkers and bikers and joggers and stray cats. I met several neighbors I had never seen before. There was the little man who screeched up to the curb, jumped out his car, and asked if I had any tennis shoes for sale. The only ones I had were girl tennis shoes, kind of like K-Swiss style, and when I showed him the pair he put one shoe next to his foot and said, "looks like just my size!" That was enough to bring blink-back tears to my eyes for the next year or so. He came back no less than three times, each time with a few more dollars for some other thing he had seen and wanted. I was glad to sell him the dresser, the shoes, the necklace, and the old jambox for next to nothing - truth is, I would have given it all to him if I thought he could use all that crap.
All in all, Brad and I took in a little over $200, which shocked me more than I can tell you. I honestly thought I'd be counting the dimes all the way up to about $27 if we were lucky, so imagine my surprise.
I know I've talked about all the panhandlers in Austin before. I keep coming back to the subject, partially because I don't know if I ever once had a homeless person ask me for money in Lubbock, so I'm still not used to the phenomenon. It's just not built into my psyche - I see the same people on the same intersections almost every day, and I feel the same twinge of guilt and sadness every day.
I decided a while back that it wasn't doing anyone any good for me to give away my spare change when asked. First of all, I know well from my time in AmeriCorps that there are places that homeless people can go for help. I also know that panhandling is a way of enabling, and I don't want to feed into the cycle. Also, I'm not made of quarters, and as it turns out, Brad and I need pretty much all those quarters to make it from one week to the next.
To be honest, sometimes I get angry at panhandlers. For example, I don't like giving other people my age money on the way to my J-O-B. There is this one couple, early-twenties, who have been working the intersection of S. Lamar and Ben White for weeks now. They wear tank tops and camouflage shorts and have piercings and wallets with chains in them. They are tan. Their sign says something about "Need to get home." They are there every freaking day. Sure, I don't know what their situation is. I don't know if they've tried to get work. I do know that when I see them now I think, you know - there must be some pretty good money in this if they keep coming back to this same intersection every day.
I can't help feeling guilty for having that attitude, and I can't help feeling like a bitch seeing it written out in black and white like this. Am I wrong? What's the right answer?
I keep re-writing this part of the post, and I'm not sure why. I start to apologize and explain what I'm trying to say, but the truth is, I don't know what I'm trying to say. All I know is that I am one of the sympathetic, liberal, hands-across-America people, and I also have issues with certain panhandlers. I suppose that's a contradiction.
Aha! So there.
Here's a chicken-or-the-egg question for you. Where do panhandlers get the markers they make their signs with? I ponder this more often than I probably should.
Speaking of, yesterday I passed a panhandler with a cardboard sign that said - wait for it - nothing. He was holding up a piece of blank cardboard. I almost wanted to applaud his sense of humor and/or irony. And give him a Sharpie.
By the way, our IT department completely recovered our missing data drive. I was so happy that I actually did the dance of joy.
It's marvelous when things work out.
Lucy loves you |
