June 2, 2004

Times FeatureMurray Frymer

Junk in, junk out

By Murry Frymer
Staff Writer

We have an annual community garage sale in my neighborhood. I’ve never taken part. The idea of buying somebody’s throw-aways has never appealed to me.

But this year it finally occurred to me that somebody might well find my throw-aways appealing. I have kept some of them long enough for them to have acquired a quaintness that, I have been told, might appeal to somebody who needs more quaintness in their lives. Yes, quaintness can enliven a home that has everything but quaintness.

I had also recently run into a man who deals with estate sales and he told me some interesting tales of just how lucrative junk can be. Or, to put it another way, maybe some of my junk isn’t really junk. In another’s eyes, it might be, well, something you would pay good money for.

I took a walk around my garage and found a wall mirror that was still in the shipping box sent from our old home 25 years ago. It’s amazing how invisible old boxes can be in a garage. You stop seeing them or wondering what’s inside them.

Barb found an Early American water crock that had somehow made it into the garage and been forgotten. And then there was that collection of pure walnut bookshelves that needed just a little oiling. Pure walnut! I wondered what that cost these days.

There was an attractive original painting that a fellow had done for Barb and somehow had never made it to our walls. Suddenly, staring at it from the right angle, I felt that this painting was really quite beautiful. In an art store, it might go for good money.

And, oh, my garage library of books! Many are classics. Many are just so dusty they look like classics. I amazed myself at all the desirable goods I was able to find. I was not even sure why I had kept them all for so many years. Was I waiting for a connoisseur to accidentally stumble into my garage?

Well, the day of the garage sale happened and I carried the items to a neighbor’s house, which was my local outlet for the sale tour. I added an old desk that I had used in my high school days. The chair that came with it was a bit shaky and had collapsed when it was last used. But it fit the desk in style and color. And, I thought, it had a nice puffy white seat that with a little of the right cleaner, could make it sparkle.

My neighbor suggested lower prices than I had originally stuck to the items. Well, I wasn’t sure about value, but put all these prices together, I thought, and it would still be enough to buy…well, maybe a meal…at a not-too-fancy restaurant.

At 8 in the morning, the cars were already pulling up at my neighbor’s driveway. These early birds seemed especially eager. They told me of some other purchases in previous years that were positively steals.

The man who conducts estate sales told me he had purchased a set of original china, hand-painted, for $25. It was worth 20-30 times that, he said. This man actually has two garages because in his line of work he accumulates so much booty.

Anyway, I hung around my own booty watching to see if there was any movement or listening to hear the opinion of the potential buyers. Our water crock sold quickly. But that was because Barb had put a price of $3 on it and it was the equivalent of store-bought goods at $30 or so. The man carrying it away seemed quite happy with his find. His wife beamed, too.

But the wall mirror was attracting little attention. Neither were my walnut shelves, though I kept arranging them differently. And I underlined “pure walnut” on the sign. The original painting definitely needed a museum for proper display.

I did sell an old aluminum ladder for $2. That was pure profit, since it had been left behind at my house by a gardener who apparently got out of the business and never came back.

The desk didn’t sell, but, remarkably, the rickety chair did. For two bucks, I think I was so thrilled that I forgot to tell the man not to sit in that chair, though you could hang it on a wall for funky effect.

Lovely lamps didn’t move. I asked the estate expert whether I should sell a beautiful Scandinavian rug that had been under my dining table for decades. He suggested a price that kept the rug just where it was.

By the end of the day, I had made about $15, not quite enough for a restaurant meal, unless it was McDonald’s. My neighbor said that she could use my wall mirror so I gave it to her. She happened to be selling two modern clocks out of her husband’s former office. I like clocks and she gave them to me.

She took some more of my junk. I took her two clocks to my house.
I had to carry my walnut shelves and the desk and some other things back home. All that work was worth more than $15, I thought.

Next year maybe I will try to sell my neighbor’s clocks. I wouldn’t be surprised if she would be pushing my old wall mirror. We might just exchange again.