One man's junk

One mans junk is another mans treasure.
This past weekend, it became clear that my husband(Tom) and I are opponents in that age-old argument of couples: Treasure versus junk. One of our treasures, our dear dog Lucky ran out of luck and experienced violent seizures last Thursday. Taking him to the vet cost two of my paychecks (that’s not saying much). Feeling frustrated at our monetary situation, Tom declared that we should have just put the dog down. “After all”, he said, “he is old and we can get a new dog”. That of course enraged the rest of the family and it got me thinking: I wish “Putting him down,” would have been an option for me when Tom went through knee surgery and four months of home recovery. After all, he is old and well ... .

After spending the day at the vets, the dog is diagnosed with Cushing disease and medicated. I guess it’s common in Great Danes and Labs and poor Lucky dog has both strikes against him. He is a mutt, old and a bit dusty. But we certainly wouldn’t get rid of him nor upgrade to a newer model. He is our equivalent of beloved family junk, in other words, pure Wycoff gold.

On Friday Tom left to help our family friend Don move out of his foreclosed home. A sad commentary on the current situation in our state. All your belongings have to be loaded up and pawned off on friends and relatives who will store them in the hopes that one day, the winds of favor will grant you property possession again. In the meantime, the temporary proprietors reap the rewards of storing your stuff. Don held a yard sale, but knowing him, it wouldn’t make a dent in the junk collection he vowed to “fix up” one day. I visited his place once, awestruck by the acres of machinery and pipes, accumulation of old cars and vacuum cleaners. At one time, Don even had a by-plane graveyard in addition to a collection of above ground wells. It was like walking through a weird outdoor art gallery. I guess in some cultures it would be considered modern art. After all, if people are paying through the nose for art done by an elephant, why not? Don is just like the character Fred Sanford in Sanford and Son, he saw potential in everything, even stuff that was rusted out, busted and left for dead. I however, don’t care for junk. Don refers to me as Tom’s neat freak woman. If I don’t use it within the two major seasons then it is outta here! Though not a Stepford wife, I do tend to keep a tidy house and I can’t stand knick knacks, they make me feel claustrophobic. My kids are forever squawking about my cleaning rampages. I have hauled several garbage bags of junk out of their rooms, all accomplished without them missing their favorite pipe cleaners, rocks and moldy twinkies. We now use rakes for the junk under their bed because of a moldy twinkie experience (I once attempted to retrieve what I thought was a fuzzy green eraser and it turned out to be, you guessed it)!

Late last night, I noticed a strange vehicle slowly backing into our driveway. The loaded down truck was teaming with junk, seeping over it’s sides so that the emblem on the side wasn’t visible. An enormous aluminum fishing boat sat atop a rusted trailer, they were bouncing their way backward into our driveway, nearly tipping over from the barrage of junk piled in it. Suddenly, I realized this was my husband, coming home from a weekend at Don’s. Might as well have been Weekend at Bernies. For all I knew, there could have been a body at the bottom of the pile.
He sheepishly got out of his pickup, slamming his door and nearly toppling a chainsaw tethered to the side. “Hey hon, can you back your car out of the garage?”
It is a curious thing when you can simultaneously think two expletives to shout, but just then my kids ran out of the house to greet their father. “Wow! That is cool” exclaimed our other Sanford in the family. “Is all this ours?” My son asked already determining the Ebay price for some of the items. This is the same kid who uses Legos as weapons of mass destruction against parents who dare trespass into his bedroom at night. “Well, the motorcycle and motorized scooter are ours, I got them at a steal and the boat, we can use and the chainsaws just need to be fixed up and we can sell them for profit.”
He rattled on, captivating our kids with each items history and potential.
It was all I could do to not clutch my chest and scream out, “I’m a comin’ Elizabeth...I’m a coming” (Sanfords old bit about having a heart attack and meeting up with his deceased wife). I kept envisioning that Tom would eventually need an intervention. Are there interventions for junkers? I suppose it would be along the lines of families that go through substance abuse interventions: We'd all gather Tom in the looming backyard/junkyard, our once pristine pool a vestibule of used tires, wet suits and swingsets. I'd have to recruit back-up and the only person close enough to Tom and who is (gulp) as neat of freak as me is (double gulp) his mother. Visions of our feme de muerte battles outweighing the junk intervention caused me to tank the entire idea. There had to be a better way! Go here for the theme song while you read on: http://www.sitcomsonline.com/sounds/sanfordandson.wav

After the kids settled down for bed, my tired treasure hunter secured his treasure in our backyard, complete with a tattered tarp. There was no way I was giving up my CRV parking space. Hell, in this job, I don’t get paid but I do get a parking space.
In this sitcom of our life, the role of Lamont is often played by me, the questioning, nagging, common sense character. Most men call that bitchy.
“So hon, how much did that bike and scooter set us back?” I tried to be as Lamont as I could, trick the sly fox into telling me his latest scheme gone bad so I could do damage control.
Besides, he was pretty tired, there was a good chance he would spill the beans.
“Oh well, that came out of my account, so you don’t need to worry about it.”
His account? He has an account? Anger turned to curiosity. I have an account too, but it is often used for frivolous stuff, such as: Kids clothing, field trips, soccer sign ups, my cell phone and oh yes, saving our beloved pets ass.

“So how much was the motorcycle and scooter, really?” I knew asking again would be pushing it but I just had to know. “Together they only put me in the hole for $700. But remember, those chainsaws I’ll sell as well as the oven hood, and besides, we can use the boat anytime we want.”
“And if they don’t?” I asked, pushing for a time limit for his new endeavors into the junk yard business.
He sighed, “I’ll get rid of this stuff before the summer.”

Wishing I still drank, I made my way into our backyard and lifted the tattered tarp, wanting a good look at Don’s treasures. Shining in the moonlight, they almost looked beautiful. The glistening of a chrome oven hood. A colorful array of paint chips fallen from the boat(Don had changed the name so often, it reminded me of the Norman Rockwell Tattoo illustration). The glint of steal chainsaws, shadows of various rusted out tool chests and the conjoined smell of metal and male perspiration. Our Lucky dog saddled up beside me to observe the treasure. As if sensing my disgust, he snorted and then shook his head, then cocked it to the side and winked at me. He was not made to be a junk yard dog. If anyone dared jump Lucky's fence to get to Tom's future junk treasures, then it would be death by saliva! He'd hold them down and lick them to death!
A Lamont moment hit me like a ton of bricks: If Tom didn’t get rid of this junk before the weeds grew over it, well then, with the help of craigslist, he will become a junk hauler(unbeknownst to him of course). As the theme song of Sanford and Son lulled me to sleep, I dreamed of my dog leaping and bounding among the sunflowers that will eventually replace Tom’s junk yard.

If you need junk hauled away, keep Tom in mind for future reference, however, if you can’t park your car in the garage, if your home resembles that of a mobile home estate sale, if you think an antique fire hydrant should go onto antique roadhouse, then you are a Sanford wife, husband or child and should seek immediate help.

www.1800gotjunk.com
www.junkhaulers.com


All rights reserved, Anne Wycoff April 2008