Being the single income earner for my large family ever since the kids started coming 28 years ago, my family budget has often been stretched big time. Note I said nothing about being the single income worker: No one one slaves for the good of my family more than my wife. I'm sure many of you guys would say the same about your respective wives.
And if you don't, shame on you.
That being said, we have turned bargain hunting and quests for deals into a science. What with, garage sales, thrift stores, and any sign in any store that spells C-L-E-A-R-A-N-C-E, we have dressed and eaten most acceptably (my opinion only, of course) for these past thirty years.
One advantage with not having two incomes, ie., having extra money for extra clothes, is that we often have a revolving wardrobe. Hats and coats, shirts and pants, even shoes tend to be bought up and brought in one year, worn up then simply worn out the next. If someone else's clothes are the highlight of poor man's fashion, then we as a family are as dapper as they come.
Oh, I forgot about the other place I "shop." It is actually a lot cheaper than the cheapest thrift store, though clothes are impossible to find there. In today's political parlance, it is called a waste transfer station (WTS); back in the days when gas was $1.00 a gallon (note: gallon), it had a another name.
It was called a "dump," as in D-U-M-P, a place where people would dump their used and useless possessions.
Quite frankly, I wish I was so rich that I could dump what gets dumped in the dump. I have shocked, thrilled, and maybe even ticked off some of my equally-frugally friends with the "clearance" items that I have found at the local WTS in recent months.
As I write this witty prose in the brave solitude of my family office, my wife—the hard-working, constantly serving one I wrote about—is sitting at another desk in a different corner on a very nice office chair. In fact, it is almost as nice as the one I'm sitting in, the same one that retails for about $200 from Staples--except hers was free. All we had to do was put a few wheels on for a mere $25.
In a few minutes she will be going upstairs to put some of the kids to bed; she'll be sitting on a rocker-recliner that I also found at the WTS store. I saw a the identical chair in a recent Sears catalogue, retailing for pennies just under $400.
I don't feel richer by getting these items, but I certainly feel wiser. I can't fathom—nor can the scavengers, er, people who were with me recently at the WTS store—how people can dump off lawnmowers, chairs, walkers, windows, desks, and bikes (just for starters). The waste, the careless waste, is actually quite revolting. There must be a better way to dispose of the odd toy or piece of furniture that seems no longer useful. Maybe a better equipped clearinghouse, where these things could be re-furbished and given to our less fortunate friends.
It sends all the wrong signals about us as a society: One, it shows we do not value things when they no longer work as they once did; and two, it shows the sheer shallowness of a part of the culture that no longer bothers to take the initiative to try to repair or fix things that are broke. I think there's a metaphor for marriage here, people, but that is, as I have said before, fodder for another column.
"One man's trash is another man's treasure" is an axiom for garage sales. Add "dumps" to that application, please. What one person or family de-values or discards, another seizes as a priceless (or at least useful) treasure.
I still think there's a place for garage sales, thrift stores, even a clearance department at a Walmart these days. Because I constantly fight the temptation to bring home some quaint gift from the WTS store for a family member, I need to keep all my options open. I draw the line when it comes to birthday or anniversary presents.
After all, how could I take it back? The WTS Service Counter, I hear, a hole.
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