A Great Relief: The Moving Sale Is Over

SUNDAY. 10 PM. The wind-driven summer rain doused us off and on all weekend. We covered and uncovered our stuff with tarps so many times we lost count. It's time to take down our colorful plastic "moving sale" signs, or people will continue to arrive. For the past three days bargain-hunters made the pilgrimage to Sinclair Street as if it were Mecca. At noon I revised our Deal du Jour whiteboard strategically located in the driveway, erasing the sold items and substituting the word "FREE" where prices had previously appeared. Most of our big items were sold for less than we'd hoped, but at least they're gone! It looks like my beloved piano, unsold and looking sad (and very heavy) in our now-stark living room, is desert-bound. Other unsold items were "freecycled" this afternoon. I posted an email notice to our local free-recycling group at noon. By 12:45 no one had showed up, so I left for Bella Napoli to pick up a pizza for lunch. On returning I was greeted by three minivans parked in our grassy swale, bursting at the seams with free booty. Fortunately, everyone was well behaved and no fist fights erupted over our giveaways. Later in the afternoon, a strange little man who was not a member of our group arrived on bicycle and spent over two hours going through our boxes of books. He talked incessantly to M, and when she finally pried herself away and went into the house, he continued conversing with himself. Mr. Chat-a-lot pulled all the books out of six cardboard boxes and stacked them according to the SLMDS (Strange Little Man Decimal System). To my great relief, threatening clouds and rain finally chased him away. He crammed dozens of books into plastic bags and a well-worn leather valise before wobbling off on his overloaded bicycle, headed toward the Punta Gorda bridge.

And so, the sun sets on another summer day in Florida. The tall tree in the photo permanently lists from years of stormy winds blowing in from the Gulf. Charley stripped most of the branches off, but regrowth is now visible. The yard sale was a tremendous amount of work, but now we're in a better cash position to furnish our New Mexican digs with Albuquerque consignment shop treasures. As expected, we're beyond tired and feel totally depleted. But it's nothing a good night's sleep won't cure.