Tales from the Shark Tank

Every year, the local chapters of the National Conference of Jewish Women hold a rummage sale they call “Collector’s Choice”. The people who contribute to it tend to be the kind who buy an entire new designer wardrobe every year. As you might expect, the selection is best in sizes under 10. We’re talking about fashion consciousness that rivals the editors of Vogue here.

But for all that the majority of things fit waifs, there are still several racks of things to fit those of us a bit more mature across the hips, so Sarah and I betook ourselves over there. We made out like the proverbial bandits. She got 5 pairs of comfortable shoes for a total expenditure of $30.00 that would have cost about $700.00 new, as well as several sweaters and an outfit suitable for interviewing – something she hopes will start happening soon. I got several things as well.

My real find, though, was the IBM Thinkpad. I checked; the mouse, monitor and systems all worked. The basic problem seemed to be that Windows had been uninstalled rather ineptly. Now, we have Win95 on disk at our house still – one of the benefits of packrat tendencies. So I figured I could reinstall, or failing that, find another way.

In the midst of these ruminations, an elderly gentleman walked up. “Can you get it to work?” he asked? “People have been trying all day, and no one can make it do anything.” “Mostly” was the response. “I got it switched into DOS and ran some diagnostics. The problem is that Windows is incomplete. I can fix that.” He stared. Then he offered it to me with power supply, manual and case. After a bit of bargaining, we agreed upon $10.00, and he took me straight to the cashier and told her to ring it that way, which she did. She also rang our other finds up to that point.

And then she took the current discount of 25% off the total, with the end result that I have a computer I can get working for $7.50. Even if I can’t make it go effectively, (and I really do think I can) the power supply and case alone are worth considerably more than that!

As I said, banditry – sheer banditry. I’m still grinning about it.

Through the spring and summer, I’ve been walking nearly every day. Mostly I walk by the Canal downtown. It’s a pedestrian walkway. There’s a pretty path, water and landscaping to look at, and no cars, all of which is good. No matter how hot it got, there were hordes of people out there with me.

Now the weather has suddenly remembered autumn. These past three days it’s been in the 40s instead of the 60s and 70s. On top of that, it’s been grey and rather breezy. The trees are still in glorious color, and while some are indeed bare, others are still partly green. I like bare trees, too; you can see their shapes so clearly. You can see the nests in them as well, no longer camoflaged by leaves. They don’t need it; any sensible bird has migrated if its going to and certainly there are no more fledglings to guard from predators.

I’ve put on a warmer jacket and kept right on walking, but aside from a very few intrepid or dedicated runners, no one is out there with me. Most of my walking has become a solitary meditation. It’s amazing how different the walk is when no one else is on the path with you. I watch other people if they’re around; if not, I can think things through. Both have their points, of course – people watching is a grand past-time. (I’m watching a collection of middle-school sized boys roll down the hill outside my window as I type this.) But it surprised me how quickly my fellow walkers began their hibernation. No wonder they go stir-crazy by spring. They’ve hidden at the first sharp chill in the air. I’ll still be out there until it’s icy, adding a warmer layer or a hat as needed, watching the season change.

It wasn’t that long ago I was talking about my secretary, whose uncle was moving the family of her serviceman cousin. That same weekend, she and her sister had moved their dad down to Florida to live with sis. He’d been with B., my secretary, but she has a baby at self-propelled stage and Grandfather couldn’t remember to do things like cap insulin needles and dispose of them out of reach. He was also coming to need far more care than B. and her husband could provide. Her sister, on the other hand, is a nurse, married, childless and in a warm climate. They knew they were making arrangements for the last months of their father’s life, and went about doing what they could to make that time comfortable for him.

His time was shorter than anyone guessed. They flew down to Florida October 18th. Today my secretary greeted me with heavy eyes and the news that he had left this life two hours earlier. I’ve approved bereavement leave and helped her find a bereavement discount on airfare. She’s flying out tomorrow morning. She’ll be back in a week. It will take a lot longer before she stops second guessing herself on whether the move itself was the stress that tipped the man over the edge.

I just returned from my periodic November pilgrimage to my local precint voting location. I gave them my name and signed in, pausing as usual to chat with the poll workers. Democrats are such an endangered species in this part of town that there is no Democratic precinct person; the Republican committeewoman checks everybody off. I thought about working it this year, just for balance, but it doesn’t work with the obligations of getting Joseph to school or picking him up at the end of the day.

Then I proceeded to the Judge’s station, which is where you sign your name and affirm that you do indeed still live at the same address. They then instruct you on how to cast your ballot.

When I started voting in the mid seventies, Indiana used a paper ballot that you filled in like a standardized test and dropped into a large sealed box to be tallied at the end of the day. The next election, they had lever machines, and boy were they a Big Deal. Those lever operated machines remained the standard, at least in Marion County, until this year. Manual and self contained, they were not particularly error prone.

But progress must march, and we have come to the era of the digital scanner, a computer driven self contained sealed box. I signed in and looked around, and saw, not the familiar curtained booths, but tall tables with cardboard privacy screens around them. I was given a paper ballot and instructed to fill in the bubbles beside the names of those for whom I wished to vote completely, as if I were taking a standardized test. Then I was to take it to the digital reader and feed it into the sealed box, so that my votes could be tallied. The only thing different from voting in the seventies is that the tally is kept as the votes are cast, instead of being added at day’s end. Maybe it’s just me, but can someone explain to me how this constitutes a step forward?

You know you’re in trouble when the first thing you think on waking isn’t about the blueness of sky, or breakfast, or whatever other mundanity presents itself. If your first thought is “I have to get up. I have promises to keep.” you aren’t off to a good start.

But for all that a lot has gotten done, and the frame of mind has improved accordingly. Our friend has arrived, and we have embarked on a wild sort/ pitch/ store spree that makes my preparations for her arrival look like a PeeWee team practicing at major league Spring Training. She has no emotional investment in this stuff, and her objectivity is helping me to keep going. The result is several well packed plastic storage bins and another carful of bags to go to the battered women’s shelter. I’m even beginning (barely) to see the space our activities have cleared.

I’m a packrat, of a long line of accomplished hoarders, so it takes a fair amount of clearing to make a visible dent. But in this as in many other things, I am determined not to be my parents. They have so much stuff, piled here and there and stuffed into closets and boxes and bins, that when they need something they end up buying another one because they have no idea where the one they had is. It’s completely overwhelming. I’m dreading the time at which Wick and I have to go through it and dispose of the archeological layers. I suspect we’ll be renting a dumpster.

But I get to start by finding my own house under some accumulated layers. Then I’m going looking for the garage, which is currently a no-car model. Some of it will go to charity, some to friends, and some on e-bay. And we will get something better. We will get space. Hopefully this time we’ll keep track of it.