Ruminating On Rummage by J.E. Dean

It started in March when I first saw a notice for the June 6 Oxford Fire Company Auxiliary Rummage Sale. I smiled in anticipation and immediately entered two dates on my calendar. June 5 to drop off items for donation and June 6 for the actual sale. I also started my list of what to donate. 

Uncharitable people have described me as a packrat. It’s not a compliment, but sadly true. As I have traversed several decades, I have held onto things that should have been discarded or donated long ago. As a result, when we moved to the Eastern Shore many years ago, a garage full of stuff came with us.

I suffer no illusions that the items I brought to the Eastern Shore were somehow valuable, but I also concluded that they were not ready for the trash bin. Things like old screwdrivers, bird houses never put in the yard and still in their original packaging, and children’s fishing rods, shingles for a house I no longer own, and jars full of miscellaneous, unsorted nuts and bolts, all came with me.

Occasionally I need something to solve a problem in the house and find the solution waiting for me in the garage. This was the case with a monkey wrench that sat untouched for more than a decade. A grass-seed spreader also came out of a long retirement to help reseed a bare spot in the yard.

Each one of these events, in my mind, suggests that I am not a hoarder because an unneeded item was “needed.”  I also picture hoarders as people who live with stacks of old magazines and newspapers, dozens of plastic containers from Chinese meals, and clothes that they ceased to fit in decades ago. I don’t fit this description which, I recognize, may be unfair.

While I am not a hoarder, I am, in some ways, worse. I realized I wasn’t discarding items I seldom use because you never know when that “tool” may come in handy. I know, for example, few people may want the several old hammers in my garage. But the hammers still drive nails—earlier this month I used one to hang a picture.

How do you give old, unneeded items one last chance? My answer was rummage sales. That is why I was so excited about Oxford Fire Company Auxiliary’s June 6 sale. It was a chance to kill two birds with one stone—I clear out space in my garage and, at the same time, relieve myself of any guilt associated with throwing out perfectly good, but used items.

This year I compiled a list of planned donations over a two-month period. I worked on the list only occasionally. (So don’t call the mental health department.) My list included fishing rods I would never use again, a large bag of miscellaneous fishing gear, a bait bucket, and an old compound bow I bought on a whim, apparently after watching Robin Hood. 

I also knew I had at least a dozen shirts I no longer wore. The shirts were clean and waiting for a chance to be worn. I also had, and still have after the rummage sale, a plentiful supply of pants that no longer fit. (I hate shrinkage.)

I also realized I had unused coffee mugs, including one reading, “Over the Hill,” that “a friend” gave me on a birthday more than a decade ago. I never used it but would have felt guilty throwing it out. (I thought about regifting it to the “friend,” but on occasion I try to be nice.) There was also a diverse collection of mismatched drinking glasses.

On June 5, I delivered these items to the firehouse after giving them a collective “goodbye.”  But as I drove away, I felt relief and liberation, from the items. Marie Kondo would have been proud and likely would have taken credit for my action simply because I read her book on “tidying up.”

The next day my wife wanted to go to the rummage sale. I feared she would return with more items than I had donated, but that did not happen. I declined to join her at the sale because I didn’t want to see my donations sitting on a table, ignored by the hoard of bargain hunters. 

I also confess that rummage sales, in addition to providing me with the means of “tidying up,” also make me sad. As I walk through rummage sales and see the stacks of now-unwanted items, including trophies awarded to people no longer alive, paintings of forgotten relatives, and lots of baby clothes, I think about people who are no longer with us or who otherwise have become separated from things that once graced their homes or lives.

One more thought on the rummage sale. The people who organize and run it are exceptional. As I dropped off items this year, I was greeted warmly and thanked for bringing them. I was also offered help unloading items. I saw numerous volunteers setting up tables, sorting items, and otherwise preparing for the sale the next day. On Saturday, I drove by the sale. It was a madhouse. Dozens of people were looking for bargains and an opportunity to support our firefighters.

So, I am done ruminating for now but am not done with rummage. I fear I could live another 50 years and still have items crying out—begging—to be donated.