Garage Saling Notes

A couple of weeks ago I took Emily and three of her friends garage saling. This was Emily’s choice of a birthday adventure and was intended to also provide fodder for my next article.

The article didn’t come together in the same mysterious way that sometimes pudding or jello simply won’t gel. My notes seemed to be all about girls snapping at each other. But Amy thought I should post something from the notes anyway.

Ok.

We get in the van and Emily whips out her notebook. “I wanna read you my latest dream.”
The others groan.
Emily, undaunted, reads.
They laugh.
“Now I wanna read you my latest story.”
More groans.
She reads.
They laugh.

Mysterious phrases followed by wild laughter:
“It’s a ghoooost.”
“I got your email about Mudd.”
“Remember to wash your socks today.”

Me: dear me.

“Why do they say a dog is a man’s best friend?”
“It should be a woman!”

Stephanie C. starts a story on Belt Line Road and has said “like” 14 times before we reach Hwy. 99.

Me: Dear me.

It is hot. Very hot. The sun glares off all the garage sale stuff and it’s hard to focus. The girls descend on each sale like hens to the feeder and the old ladies look at them and smile or look flabbergasted.

They admire old gloves, old clothes, anything impractical.

SC tells of the time she answered the phone and thought it was Arlene so she said, “Yessss. Whaddaya want THIS time??” and here it was Emily and Stephie’s grandma.

Emily shrieks. “Is that a stinkbug??”
Bethany: No wonder you stink.
Emily pinches her.
Bethany: I’ll chuck you in the creek.

Me: Dear me.

An arm jabs in front of me just as a Willamette Ag truck passes. “KURT!! Hey KURT!” yells SC.
Who’s that?
Kurt! He works with my dad!
Him? He’s old!
He has some cute kids, like, boys.

The other girls imitate her for a few miles. “Kurt! Hey Kurt!”
Stephie: You’re mean.
Bethany: Yeah, it’s my hobby.

Me: Dear me.

Bethany: Emily, knock it off. Your fingernails are not trimmed enough! You’re making marks on me!
SC: I used to bite myself, like, in church, to make marks on my arm.

Me: Dear me.

At one point the girls snatch the notebook out of my lap and write their own version of things:
Dorcas: goes driving full spede over the curb when driving out of the gas station. Then she goes creaming over the curb at dairy Qween.

SC finds a denture container in the free box. She gets it for her mom.

It is very hot.

At DQ, the girls walk to the door and Stephy S. gives the door a hard push and then notices the sign that says “PULL”

They slam each other’s handwriting on the way home and suddenly we pass a pasture and they burst into a chant: Four. White. Horses. Standingbyariver. Hey. Hey. Etc

They have a staring contest.

Me: Dear me.

We get home and they all go swimming.
I relax with a tall glass of iced tea.


Quote of the Day:
“Whew!”
--me, after I survived an afternoon of garage saling with four girls, taking them to the Deep Hole, sending them through the shower after they swam, feeding them, and getting them to the scrapbook party in Halsey where I delivered them all safely back to their moms