What's old is..still old. Thank god

I am very anti-stuff. I grew up in stuff. Every shelf, counter top, bookcase, drawer, cabinet was crammed, piled, collapsing under the weight of stuff. Thinking back on my childhood the most vivid memories of my parents house that I have are of piles of mail, cabinets full of papers, shelves full of unused and often broken appliances, bins of plastic things, and medicine bottles...lots and lots of those. A pill for whatever ached you-a gadget for whatever plagued you-a decoration -a collectible for whatever hole you needed to fill...
Between the ages of 17 and 24 I moved 13 times. I stopped collecting stuff. Stuff became weight. Weight became a destroyer of possibilities. I grew increasingly unhappy with the amount of clutter in my life. I bought a pick-up truck. After my move to Ann Arbor when I was 24, I vowed that (with the exception of a bed) I would be able to move everything important to me in that truck if I needed to.
I watched the evacuations of Katrina and I got rid of more stuff. Whenever something comes into my house, something else has to leave.

So it was a big deal this weekend to find myself at the Luckey, Ohio Fall Festival. Luckey is a very small town Ohio small town. The fall fair was buzzing with tractor pulls, fried food goodness and yes, I was thrilled to find...a flea market.

I haven't been to a flea market since I was a kid. My grandfather (Pa, as we called him) used to drag us down (or up, I was never sure where exactly we were) to these a least a couple times every few months. I never remembered much except Pa strolling along the dirt aisles, slowly but not expressing interest in anything in particular. We would play with dirty toys and old tools, and try not to be interested in the cases of knives and lighters. I would always gaze longingly at the iron on patches, swiss army knives and pocket watches. I had learned already not to ask for those things. I could have a piece of jewelry or a stuffed animal if I wanted, but never a pocket-watch. Usually we would walk out of there with something small. A Skelator figure for my older brother and a coin from a foreign country for me. And I am pretty sure, the exchange of money for a pack of 12 tube socks was involved for Pa.

At Luckey, I was thrilled to see that as far as flea markets go, the good ones never change. There were the packs of tube socks now also stocked next to "diabetic socks" dear god, there were the old toys, the shotguns, the hunting knives, the precious moments statues, blankets with team names, hand saws, duck sculptures wearing human clothes, men with hats proclaiming " git er done" women with drawn on eyebrows and la-hots of makeup, dogs, boy scouts, american flags and yes...Confederate flags. All of this plus fried catfish, applebutter, 2 lesbians and a beagle.

Aside from the homages to slavery, I was actually having a hell of a good time. We sorted carefully though the booths, sticking close to our anti-stuff policies, me suppressing my overstuffed upbringing. Suppressing the urge to splurge was actually made easier by the flocks of older women mostly (some men as well) trudging though the fair with rolly-baskets. Rolly baskets overflowing with NEW things...gadgets for cooking bacon in the microwave, giant pooh bear blow up lawn ornaments, ceramic pumpkins with faces, statues of cats, wooden cut outs of chickens, hair products, nascar hats, truck accessories, all new, still in the boxes

I thought well hell. That is missing the point. You don't go to flea market to get Walmart stuff even cheaper than walmart! You go to find really cool old stuff and make it cool again. Weird ass stuff that is so fabulous or so hideous that it has to go in your home. So the next time you have friends over someone can say "Oh what the hell is that"

I thought I was doing really well in Luckey. We had picked out a few fabulous items (and before buying had identified which items, in turn would be headed for Salvation Army). I was dressed in sneakers and flannel and thought I was blending until I went to a booth with old buttons and before I had spoken the owner of the booth identified the "No Bush-Shit" and the "Hillary for the Senate" buttons as one that might be of interest to me. I bought the Hillary button and resigned myself to sticking out.
But I was glad to be sticking out. Glad to be strolling down the dirt aisle with my fabulous girlfriend, an old cigar box and a pair of silver cowgirl boot salt and pepper shakers bouncing in my bag, an applebutter sandwich in my hand, wondering what time it was and wishing I had remembered to wear my pocket watch.

Taking up space at the flea market, saving up space on my bookshelves...

-QC

p.s. a sampling of what we did get...A princess leia wind-up toy, aformentioned cowgirl boots, elephant ashtray/change collector