Friday, Gettin' Ready for the Garage Sale

Thanks for being so patient and comin' back today.
I got up at 7:30 Friday mornin' and was out workin' in the garage by 8. I have been walkin' through that garage for 6 months [since we first started talkin' about havin' this sale] and never REALLY looked at it with an eye for organizin' it until that mornin'.
Now, I have to confess somethin' at this point. I have a touch of OCD. I don't mean that I am one of those freaks that has to go back to the house five times to make sure the stove is turned off. Nor am I one of those Nasty-Neat, Suzy Homemakers. Those of you out in the Blog-O-Sphere who have been in my home can give a hearty “AMEN” , can't you? I mean, I like my clutter in nice, little [or BIG] organized piles.
So, I spent Friday mornin' organizin' the stuff in the attached garage at Mom's. Yeah, I said the ATTACHED garage. She has two garages. A double garage that's attached to the house that was built in '86. Then in '91, Daddy bought hisself a TRUCK. So he built a detached garage at the bottom of a gentle rise, on a cement slab, for his TRUCK.
I capitalize TRUCK because he always pronounced it like it was spelled with all caps. He was sooo proud of that truck. GMC Sierra, Leather upholstery, fade paint job, 10 CD changer, King Cab, cruise, every bell and whistle GM offered. Every grandchild with a Driver's License when he got it or within 3 years of a license when he got it, claimed “dibs” on the truck when he got tired of it. I think he actually parked the truck in the garage for a year. Then Mom filled it up with stuff for a garage sale.
When I went out there Friday, I couldn't even get all the way to the back of the building it was so jammed with “stuff”. In fact, I didn't even know there was a door at the back, on the side until Saturday morning! A sliding, overhead door that my brother and I opened for extra light and ventilation.
I took a break Friday to go have Lunch with the Class of '45. This is my Daddy's graduating class from Killeen High School. It is also the Championship Football Team he played on. I had a GRAND time with those folks! I sat between Sue and Grace and across from Doris and AnnieRoe.
Now Sue is Windy's wife. Windy and Daddy were teammates. Sue is also Cole's Mom. Cole and my older Bro Doug were friends in Elementary and Jr. High school. Sue inherited Daddy's hearing aids after he died. Just that morning I had found a box with a hearing aid accessories and batteries. I told Sue I'd give her the accessories and sell her the packages of batteries for 10 cents each if she'd come to the garage sale on Saturday. She said it was a deal. When she told me she was wearing Daddy's hearing aids, I told her I was wearin' his shirt. We laughed and said, “Well, he's with us in more than spirit today!” Sue also went to church with my Doc's folks and watched him grow up. So I always give her a report on him.
Grace's husband Toby was the first person I ever remember callin' me “HollyB”. He and Daddy worked together at the Post Office. Toby was the Post Master before Daddy became PM. Our families went to church together. I had a crush, like most of the girls at church, on Grace's son Gary, for years. We had a gabfest catchin' up on everyone at church.
Now Doris was there with her daughter Dina,who was visiting from Abilene. Doris couldn't place me at first. Once I said Daddy's name, then she said Mother's name and Duncan, the name of the street they were living on when I was born. Turns out she lived next door. Remembered that Mother had an Aunt that lived close, too. I said, “Yes, Ma'am. FayeBelle. She and Spencer lived on the corner of 10th and Dean, across from the Littles.” She came back with, “Now I remember!” Don't you just LOVE those moments?
But Miss AnnieRoe? She has GOT to be in her 90's, and she looks younger than some of these folks just now 80. Sharp as a tack. She always asks about Doug. Tells me she remembers him as being such a sweet little boy. She was his 1st grade teacher. Y'all, he is 56 years old. How many of y'all reckon your 1st grade teacher remembers you? When I told her his daughter Katy is an elementary school teacher, she just beamed!
But, once lunch was over, I had a couple of errands to run. I had to go to Home Depot. In August, I had told the Bro who lives a mile from Mom that her garage opener needed a new battery. Did he buy her one? NO! He gave her his opener. So I took the batteries from the openers for both garages and went to Depot and got a two battery pack for each of them. I also pick up a couple of colored Sharpies so I could make signs for the merchandise.
Then I went to the grocery store to get the stuff I needed to make “City Steak”. I figured my Bro and his wife who were comin' in from my part of the State to help with this sale and Mom and I would want something hearty to eat after a day of selling stuff. City Steak was one of Mom's special dishes for years. I don't make it exactly the same way she did, but it's still darn good. And I could get it started in the morning, let it simmer all day. Then when the sale was over, all I'd have to do was make some rice and green beans and we'd be ready to eat.
When I got back to the house, I figured I'd best take a look in the detached garage. It had been so long since I'd been down there, I couldn't remember what sort of lighting was in there, what was stored down there, or anything.
Oh, my GATOS!
There were light fixtures, but the bulbs were burned out and I couldn't get to them because there were tables piled with “stuff” in the middle of the room and I couldn't climb on them because of my knee. I could tell there was more stuff at the back of the room, but I couldn't see it because it was too dim. As I stated earlier, I couldn't even see the side roll-up door at the back. I left the main door up to let it air out. When my cousin got there, after his classes were over, he's a teacher, maybe we could get some of the clutter out of the front and he could put in a new bulb for me.
In the mean time, I went back up to the main garage and started carrying light stuff out to the driveway outside the garage. I carried out empty boxes, which made more room to display saleable items inside the garage. I carried out lightweight stands, like plastic bookcases we could put stuff on the next morning.
Once I had more space in the garage, then I could start “grouping” like items together. I put all the arty stuff together. All picture frames, pictures, cards, postcards went together. All flowerpots, baskets, potting soil, sphagnum moss went out in the driveway. So did the lawn chairs, cot and sleeping bags. All the gee gaws were on one table. All the lamps and lamp shades together. Kitchen stuff together, that included the coffee makers [3] and toaster oven and warming tray.
Once Cousin Charley got there, we went up to the attic. I showed him the stuff I had drug out of the attic back in May [?]. He began lugging it down stairs and just made a line of it down one edge of the driveway. We sold boxes of toys for $1/box. There are some VERY happy kids in Killeen this week.
When he'd brought everything down from the attic, we went down to the detached garage. First thing we did was to take the 6 long, narrow tables that were stacked in rows on each other outside and line them up. After they were out of the way, I could actually SEE and get to the very back. There was a HUGE table in the back with craft supplies and material on it. Unfortunately, most of the material had been back there so long, and been unprotected, so either it had gotten dusty or there was bug-speck on it, and it wasn't in usable condition.
I started a trash pile outside that garage of rusty metal, holey buckets, wood scraps, and broken tools. I cannot believe there were items out there that actually had tags on them that said “doesn't work, 50 cents”. Or “personal care” items that I KNOW came out of my grandmother's house. The house that was sold in 1985.
My Bro who came to help, NOT the one who lives in town, and his wife came to Killeen after they got off work Friday night. They made it in about 9 and we stayed up talkin' out on the back porch 'til almost midnight.
This is turnin' out to be a LOT longer than I thought it would be, so I'm gonna make this a two parter.