Here’s the thing about garage sales: they make me slightly nervous.
It’s an opportunity cost thing. You don’t know what any given garage sale will be offering, and meanwhile the one thing that you’d really like, the single perfect item which you would buy if only it were right in front of you, is undoubtedly in another sale somewhere else run run run! It’s easy to lurch from garage sale to garage sale like you’re in some demented marathon along a street decorated with slightly ratty clothes and stuffed animals that are missing limbs.
The entire garage sale culture helps foster this paranoia. Sale starts at 7 AM? Then people will show up at 6, or perhaps 5:30, asking if they can get an advance look at what you’re offering.
It’s my fault that both Eli and Liza now love going to garage sales. One Saturday morning we got up early, went to a few garage sales, and ended at the local doughnut shop for breakfast. Eli and Liza quickly realized that they could turn small amounts of cash into broken toys that they would love intensely for at most two hours after we got home. Now this has become a regular thing, which means we have to be up and moving far earlier than is really healthy for any normal adult. If we don’t get to the sales quickly, then doughnut breakfast is delayed and Eli and Liza become octopuses with a penchant for grabbing and whining.
Besides, the perfect item I never knew I needed will be gone if I don’t go early.
I’m going to go ahead and admit that I giggled my way through this until I began to seriously ponder the topic and whether I am ready to begin this ordeal with my own children.
You should take them! They’ll be twice the fun of any of ours. 🙂
Oh, God bless that I never picked up the yard sale bug! It would completely ruin sleep in Saturdays. But then with Eli and Liza, I don’t suppose that’s on your calendar for years yet! 😉
I’m a total garage sale junkie. I never hurry to them, though. I just know what I’m generally looking for and if I find it, “yay!” if not, oh well, I got to window shop some really weird stuff. That’s why I love flea markets, too. And I don’t have to get up at the crack of dawn for those!