Trading dreams

One of the groups in the church we are attending is holding a garage sale the end of the week. What makes this different is the group is made up of pretty much all old fogies or old timers. So all these old timers are cleaning out their basements or attics or garages or spare bedrooms or closets or whereever and hauling it down to the gym.

My wife and I are doing the same thing with her being a lot more enthusiastic than me. I find this idea of us old timers getting rid of junk neat and interesting.

For some reason, people, including me, collect stuff. When we put the stuff in storage, it would seem to be valuable, so we then store it for years and even decades with the intention of maybe using it again or needing it or just don't want to part with it. So, in time, along comes something like this garage sale and we seem to want to get rid of some of the junk or hidden treasures. Key word is some!

So let's assume a #4 cast iron skillet happens to come in a week or two ago and a woman dear to my heart sees the skillet and she is as much in love with cast iron skillets as I am, so she appropriates the #4 skillet a few days early. She knew I would be happy about the acquisition of the #4 skillet. Will we use it? Probably will a few times a year. Do we need it? Probably not! But we are ahead of the game for if we haul in a pickup load and take back home a handful. We are ahead.

But when the garage sale is over and done with, what happens to that which is left? And I'm pretty sure there will be some stuff left. So what then? Marge likes to garage sell stuff while I don't. I'd rather sell what's valuable and donate all the rest. Marge and I usually take our garage sale stuff to one of the organizations in Cape Girardeau and let them deal with it. But we are simply passing the buck, so to speak. Rather then we make the final decision, we let them make the decision. I guess this doesn't seem right.

Our boys come up, and after seeing my shop full and machine shed full and store room full and on and on, they comment that we need to get rid of the junk or "collectibles." We probably do. If and when something happens to us, then the boys will have to haul off what we've saved. Most will end up in a landfill. Once Marge and I are gone, I won't care any longer what happens to it.

But what do we do with these kinds of keepsakes? They were special to our grandparents and parents, keepsakes to them and kind of keepsakes to Marge and me. But our boys won't have an attachment to any of it except through us. To them, this is just stuff, not really worth keeping, but stuff one hates to just throw away. The sad part is, much of it isn't garage sale stuff that someone else might want. It's notes or letters or newspaper articles or pictures and Marge and I aren't sure who or where or what it is. We feel guilty throwing it away, which is exactly what will happen when we pass it on to the next generation.

Some things are special. I have some cowboy gear from my early days riding horses and working cattle. We could sell it, but I'd like it to end up in a museum one day. My grandpa had a horsehair bridle that ended up in a museum back in Arthur, Nebraska. Loved walking into the old courthouse and looking it up.

I don't have the answer, and that's for sure. What I do know is that stuff is attached to memories that I want to hang on to as long as I can. So I'll probably keep the old "stuff" or treasures to enjoy the memories that come along with the "junk."