Selling Stuff

There are some people who apparently don't do too much selling of stuff at all. From time to time we see the most extreme examples of them being hauled off by the authorities for possible infringement of health ordinances or fire regulations. The media gathers gleefully, acknowledging the viewers delight in the frailty of our fellow man. The neighbors, slightly shell-shocked, are generally the ones left to provide an accompanying commentary. They explain how their offending neighbors had really seemed like such regular folks. Sure their house was a little unruly from the outside, but they'd had no idea as to the magnitude of the problem.

And finally the cameras take us inside the home to witness for ourselves. The camera crews struggle to navigate once wide hallways, on account of yellowing piles of newspapers and magazines lining the walls. Cardboard boxes stacked hap-hazardly, sag under the weight of the junk contained within. Room after room is cluttered with assorted knick-knacks, gizmos, stuffed toys, porcelain figurines and bric'n'brac, acquired, ironically, from other people's yard sales.

We, the audience watch in horrified wonder, transfixed by the sheer lunacy of accumulation out of control. What is wrong with these people we ask, as our eyes flicker nervously towards the attic or closet or where ever it is we hide away the stuff we keep, the stuff that doesn't really suit the pseudo-minimalist look we aspire to? The stuff that we just can't seem to bring ourselves to throw away; just in case we need it some day.

Then there's the people who don't suffer a hoarding-type psychosis - they just have a lot of money - and that's different. They prefer to avoid the plebian pursuits of organizing yard sales and posting hand-typed signs in shop windows and on bulletin boards. Updating cars every couple of years or so involves taking the car down to the dealership and choosing another one; driving in the old and driving out with the new. For other possessions they hire agents to act as middle men in sales deals. No muss, no fuss.

But a lot of the rest of us find ourselves going through the process of placing ads and having strangers first call to barrage us with a list of questions, and then come to our homes to see first-hand what we've got. We, with varying degrees of sincerity, take on the role of committed business-person secretly hoping that the process of shedding goods won't be a traumatic one. It helps if we've avoided becoming too attached during the period of ownership. Cars, sofas, boats, bikes - they are merely material possessions after all. And the allure of their newness, the "honeymoon phase," has hopefully had time to wear off. Still they have often come to represent something to us. They are part of a period in our lives that will never be repeated - when we lived in that house, drove that car, skied those skies. Of course it is the memories of associated events that are the most important - and you will never have to sell those, although you may lose them. But our possessions are the tangible objects associated to the event; and by that association valuable, at least if you're the type to lean towards nostalgia.

And as we go through the vaguely surreal sensation of having a stranger touch, prod, caress our stuff, we wonder what judgment they are forming about our tendencies and our taste. Although rationally speaking, we should really only care about making a sale, agreeable to both parties, we find ourselves straining to overhear any comments being made by potential buyers as they conspire, balancing pros and cons in secretive, hushed tones. And why do we feel so pleased when they comment favorably about the condition or color, like it's some kind of reflection on us and who we are? As if they can possibly validate the decisions and choices we made in our past. And whatever sadness we feel, after a successful deal, as we watch our item leave our sight, most probably for ever more (it is better that way). We now at least have some money to spend, perhaps towards purchase of a replacement item; an item that more accurately reflects the newer, older, more upwardly (sometimes downwardly) mobile and astute us. Change after all, along with memories and learning from the past, is largely a good thing.