Category Archives: Nonfiction

Priceless Garage Sale People

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You may be surprised by whom you find at a garage sale.

When you gather misfit belongings of your household, open your garage door, and offer the no-longer-treasured personal property for a pittance to the public, you’re going to come face to face with strangers you would never have intentionally thought about inviting into your home. And oh, what a shame it is that we don’t do that more often. People who shop at garage sales represent the melting pot of society. They’re genuinely interesting and have stories to tell. We can expect to bargain with them. But by talking with these opportunistic visitors, we may actually learn something about ourselves.

In my family, “garage sale” is a verb, as in: “We garage sale.” I grew up with a grandfather who frequented tag sales, yard sales, rummage sales, and garage sales. Different areas throughout the USA tend to adopt one of these terms, but overall the idea is the same. Grandpa didn’t care what anyone called their sale. For him, each designation meant roughly the same thing: he could buy items cheaply and later sell them for higher prices. But at some point, he developed an affinity for Jim Beam bottles. He hoarded so many of the decorative containers that he decided to build a small home adjacent to the one he lived in just to house his collection. He officially dubbed the building The Treasure House and boasted that it contained the largest collection of Jim Beam bottles in the world.

My own parents also eased into the hobby of collecting. On family trips, the six of us piled into our Oldsmobile Delta 88 and drove to far-off destinations. That took much longer than expected, because “Rummage Sale” signs always drew us into somebody’s yard.

One year while my family was staying in a cottage in Wisconsin, our dog died.  On our way home, my siblings and I were crying over Smokey’s death. We stopped at a rummage sale that just happened to have puppies, picked one out, and brought the little girl home. Mom thought of the perfect name: Rummy.

A childhood spent garage-saling inspired my sister’s profession. She and her husband built and own one of the largest craft and antique malls in Allen, Michigan. The business is so successful that there’s a waitlist of vendors, all vying for rental space to become available in the 23,000 square-foot building so they can sell their wares at the Hog Creek Craft and Antique Mall.

Although I don’t make a living at buying and reselling, like my sister does, I don’t snub garage sales or worry that some people look down upon them. Other people’s disdain doesn’t adversely affect my love for bargains. So, in search of a good deal, I occasionally stop at sales throughout the spring and summer. I do hate the amount of work it takes to organize and run these types of sales, but the hassle doesn’t stop me from doing so. Garage sales are full of fun, surprises, and inspiration.

When I stop to browse, I’m often asked by the homeowner, “Are you looking for anything special?” My answer is, “I’m shopping for our vacation Bible school program at church. I’m not really sure what I need, but I’ll know it when I see it.” With a theme in mind, my attention focuses on items that can be used as props and decorations to transform ordinary church rooms into exquisite settings for children’s enjoyment. I once bought an Ethan Allen wingback chair for $5 and felt horribly guilty applying metallic gold paint to the wooden arms. But I needed a throne for a king. Where else would I find one for that price?

I’ve had a lot of my own garage sales throughout the years. There have been many instances in which I felt like I was practically giving things away, and during my last one, I did that very thing. But I never anticipated all that I would gain simply by talking with my guests.

Here are my favorite encounters with garage sale people:

  • I eased a mother’s stress by providing decorations for her son’s high school graduation party which was less than twenty-four hours away. Decorations included a custom-designed logo of the school mascot—an original piece of artwork—created on a Lite Brite. I threw in extra pegs at no cost.
    • Realized gain: $4; pleasant feelings that I had helped an overwhelmed neighbor.
  • I changed my impression of the eccentric woman whom most everyone in the community recognized by her flamboyant clothing but never talked to. She was friendly and seemed very smart. She bought Spanish books so she could teach herself to speak the language.
    • Realized gain: $2; a spanking for allowing myself to mistakenly think that flashy clothing was the defining feature of this lovely person.
  • I provided peace and tranquility to at least one shopper by playing classical piano music on a karaoke machine I was selling. The gentleman commented, “This is the classiest garage sale I’ve ever been to.” I eventually sold the music CD to someone else and ended up donating the karaoke machine.
    • Realized gain: $1; bragging rights.
  • I inspired a middle-aged man to break into a cheer. A set of Michigan State pom-poms encouraged him, but he must not have liked the pair well enough to buy them.
    • Realized gain: $0; bewilderment and laughter.
  • I gave what was left of my expired and nearly empty tube of Benadryl anti-itch cream to a woman who was having an allergic reaction. Earlier in the day, she had bought a basket at a different garage sale and was driving around with the purchase in the back of her van. Evidently, someone’s cat had used the basket as a daybed before the piece was sold to the poor lady. The medication itself wasn’t worth anything, but the heavy-duty industrial bag I gave the woman to stuff the basket inside of had some value.
    • Realized gain: minus a dollar or so; feelings of goodwill.
  • I generated smiles by reaching out in friendship to a young family from Paraguay. The parents bought tools and household supplies. Their eldest daughter settled on a whiteboard and dry-erase markers. I gave the youngest a bilingual doll that spoke English and Spanish. The father asked if I was a teacher.
    • Realized gain: pure joy.
  • I listened intently to a woman testify that she used to be possessed by demons when she lived in Peru. I seriously wanted to hear all the fascinating details, so I gave her my phone number and hoped she would call.
    • Realized gain: awareness of evil at work in the world and thankfulness for my faith in Christ.
  • I exchanged contact information with a woman who buys clothes for a homeless man and mentors young ladies. She was generous in many ways and surprised me by donating, on the spot, to the charity I co-founded in 2016 and promoted during my sale.
    • Realized gain: a newfound friend.
  • I cried. With nearly every sale, I handed out prayer cards to customers. The prayer was special to me because I learned it from my pastor who died eleven years earlier in a car accident. One woman read the card, looked at me, and softly said, “I knew Janet.” And that’s all it took for me to feel connected to this woman who I had never met before. More words weren’t necessary. We knew Janet.
    • Realized gain: a flood of memories.

Garage sales are more than the perfect way for savvy sellers to get rid of stuff. They are more than a novel way for buyers to harness creativity and stretch dollars. These phenomenal American shopping experiences give us unique opportunities to express kindness and compassion. When we price things just right and open our doors to the world, we let in all sorts of fabulousness: priceless garage sale people.

The Truth About Golf

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I understand why some people give up on golf far too soon—before they develop a passion for the game. It challenges even the most seasoned players, requires lots of practice, and can be quite costly. For instance, Callaway’s Great Big Bertha Epic driver will set you back $500. If you want to put the club to use on a prestigious course, such as Shadow Creek in Las Vegas, you’ll have to pay another $500 for green fees. But there is ample opportunity to contain costs. You can purchase less expensive clubs; and you can play public courses in hometowns like mine for $15 a round. So considering that the financial outlay can be reasonable, I believe it’s basic intimidation that most often squashes love for the sport before a devotional spark has the slightest chance to ignite. Understanding the truth about golf may help you approach the sport with greater affection.

Golf Truth #1: It takes skill to get that little white ball flying in the air. Practice.

My first golf experience was with friends during high school. Mark was the only one of our foursome who knew how to play, and he was a patient teacher to the rest of us. Margie, Lisa, and I were athletic, so Mark probably thought we would easily learn this sport too. But taking three beginners out on a course is not the best way to introduce newbies to the game unless you’re looking to play the longest round of your life. Because Mark was dating Margie, I think he was okay whiling away the time.

The girls and I struggled to transform our softball swings into anything useful. Heck. We would have just liked to have gotten out of the Whac-A-Mole ground-pounding mode that was beating our confidence into oblivion. We were A-W-F-U-L. So bad that I’ve blotted out most other memories of that day.

But there was that one shot . . . when I struck the ball just right. It didn’t roll across the ground like it had every other time I hacked at it. This time it took flight, sailing skyward.

Personal triumphs, like lofting that little white ball for the very first time and sinking a pitch from seventy yards out, are what keep us golfers coming back. We hit the driving ranges and work on our long game. We find our putting strokes on the practice greens. And we test our fortitude by chipping out of six-foot bunkers. We want to emulate the pros, who make it all look so easy.

Golf Truth #2: It takes positive thinking (and an impressive outfit) to build a good game. Believe in your ability (and wear something that boosts your confidence).

The view of Lake Michigan from Arcadia Bluffs is as spectacular as the golf course.

Arcadia Bluffs is the number one ranked course in Michigan, where my husband booked a Memorial Day afternoon round for the two of us. That springtime day in The Great Lakes State was partially cloudy and projected to reach sixty degrees at best—chilly for me. If I had my way, all golf days would be eighty degrees and sunny, but northern Michigan isn’t known to bend to my will. So, I dressed in five layers of clothing to help me deal with the brisk air and fluctuating winds that would make the atmosphere feel ten degrees colder.

Trust me when I say that it wasn’t easy deciding on all those layers. My slacks and shirts were running a bit tight at the time, and I refused to invest in new pieces of clothing to accommodate my expanded waistline. I was counting on losing the ten pounds I kept complaining about.

I opted out of getting a propane heater for the golf cart even though I was shivering. “It will warm up,” I hoped. Standing beside our cart and waiting for our tee-time, Greg and I admired the seemingly endless and beautifully blue Lake Michigan, lying beyond the grassy bluffs and rolling terrain of the course. The view rivals that of Whistling Straits in Wisconsin, whose own gorgeous shoreline constrains the massive freshwater lake and prevents it from inching farther west.

There were several groups of men on the grounds but no women that I could see until a couple came in from their round. The model-gorgeous young lady loudly talked about how pleased she was with her 46. Whether that was her score on the front or back nine, I didn’t know. I was sizing her up and observing how attractive she was in her stretchy, black, Nike golf pants and matching jacket. Black is a great choice when you want to look slimmer, but she didn’t need the help. I wondered how she could possibly have been warm with so little to wear.

The only other woman on the course, besides me, looked like an expert—as if she could appear on the cover of Michigan Links Magazine. I compared myself to her and realized my silhouette resembled that of the Pillsbury Doughboy, plump and round. I wore a black sleeveless golf shirt just in case the temperature rose; a long-sleeved pullover because I was pretty sure it would not; and three jackets of varying thicknesses for extra protection.

So, there I was: at a mental disadvantage for golf because I didn’t feel comfortable with my weight, let alone with what I was wearing, and I had never golfed a 46 in my life.

Whether blessing or curse, the sky released a downpour. It wasn’t supposed to rain. Greg and I rushed into the clubhouse to see the storm cell on radar and ask the pro-shop attendant if we could delay our start because of the wet and cold conditions. Ideally, the rain provided me with the opportunity to change my negative mindset and prepare to golf my own best game.

Overly-critical thoughts about ourselves can have disastrous outcomes in golf. Adversaries trash-talk to mess with our heads and destroy our confidence. We shouldn’t crush our own spirits with self-condemnation. Knowing this, however, didn’t prevent me from beating up my real opponent before she had even taken her first swing.

Greg and I got a reprieve. The storm cell moved quickly, and there was a half an hour before another group was scheduled to tee-off. With no one pushing us, I expected to be able to relax.

We teed off, and I plowed through first-hole jitters by hitting a decent drive. Still, the ambiance of the exceptional course overwhelmed me. My next shot landed in a seven-foot-deep bunker and I had trouble chipping out. I took a nine on the first hole and berated myself for the embarrassing start. My focus during the next few holes was just as much on the mental battle I was having as it was with the physical trial to strike the ball well.

Once I gained control of my nerves, I began to see good results. The day progressed, layers of clothing came and went, and I shot a 100 for the round. Overall, not bad. I celebrated by buying a black and white, stretchy, athletic jacket and vowing to start my diet the next day.

Golf Truth #3: It takes knowledge of the sport to earn respect from other players. Study.

Even if swinging a club and striking a ball comes naturally, we need to acquaint ourselves with the rules governing play. Otherwise, we won’t make it past the driving range without alienating ourselves from seasoned players. They may forgive innocent mistakes made by beginners, but they have little tolerance for ongoing rudeness.

The Rules of Golf are long and daunting, and I’m not sure anyone knows them all by heart. Even golf’s greatest pros sometimes ask for clarifications from officials. The rules book is commonly tucked into golf bags and pulled out during competitions. But it rarely sees the light of day during more relaxed and friendly rounds.

If we care about the spirit of the game, and we should, we’ll grow in our comprehension of golf’s long history and honor the sport through fair and honest play under all circumstances. Golf’s two governing entities want to make the rules easier for golfers—of all levels—to understand and apply. The United States Golf Association and The R&A hope to achieve this goal by revising the rules. This is a unique opportunity for those of us enamored with the sport to directly influence the game by reading a draft of the proposed rules and providing feedback by August 31, 2017. Our suggestions could be the ones that are settled upon in the finalized rule book, expected to take effect on January 1, 2019.

Golf Truth #4: It takes patience to find the swing and strategy that work best for you. Pace yourself.

Watching a video of me hitting my driver, I was surprised to see how slow my backswing is. I’m tempted to swing faster but worry that I would lose accuracy with the change. It’s not worth that risk to me. There are other areas of my game, like putting, that I can benefit from improving instead of a major overhaul in my long game.

Being in a hurry on the course can be as big of a mistake as letting intimidation influence our confidence. The last time Greg and I were being pressed by another twosome, he and I evaluated our pace of play. We were coming in under time, as designated by course policy and indicated to us by the starter at the beginning of our round. As such, we could have defiantly held our ground and made the twosome wait at every hole. But the pace of play rule indicates that we should allow faster players to play through. This makes perfect sense, doesn’t it? Why deal with tension if you could instead alleviate it by simply being polite?

In our case, Greg and I waved for the guys to move past us and then patiently waited as each teed up, swung, and sent their shots flying forward. We watched as the second golfer searched for his ball 100 yards farther from where it was actually lying. I felt really badly telling him that his ball never made it past the forward tees. Haste makes waste, as the saying goes; and in this case, a hasty swing off the tee made for a bad shot.

So yes, it takes time and commitment to develop a love for golf. You need to approach it like you would any other relationship. Get to know its history. Who are the greats that loved it first? Regularly focus your attention on it. Is one night out a week too much to ask? Invest in it. How much better could the two of you get along if equipped with the right tools and some counseling? Shake off the tense moments and bad results. Can’t you just see how spectacular you are together too?

Control the way you think and behave, and soon you’ll be head over heels in love.

Freedom! What Freedom?

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“Barbara, your assignment is to write a 250-word essay entitled What Freedom Means to Me, my English teacher said. “I’m submitting your work to a local writing contest.”

“Yes, ma’am,” I said, not questioning why she selected that subject or why none of my classmates were given the same assignment.

She told me nothing about the rules or the real purpose of the contest, or her reason for choosing me. My writing in class garnered decent grades and some of my writing appeared in the school newspaper. However, I had never entered a contest. An essay on freedom didn’t interest me in the least.

Freedom, what freedom? I never felt the freedom to do what I wanted to do. In my last year in a junior high school, I was told I’d be going to a business high school. Not my choice. I wanted to go to the college prep high school even though I knew my parents couldn’t afford to send me to college. I had high aspirations. Without college, I knew my career options were limited. My mother thought the business high school would be good preparation for a decent office job rather than one of the many factory positions available at that time. I envisioned an unhappy, unsatisfying, boring future.

Freedom, what freedom? I attended school when you couldn’t choose your subject matter or teachers. Most of my teachers were okay, but my social studies teacher was an uninspiring, older woman who never discussed the subject. Every day, she simply told us to copy the twenty questions written on the chalkboard, find the answers in the textbook, and write those answers on the lined paper she gave us.

When that school year was over, I hoped that my next social studies teacher would be better. When I was assigned to her again, I sat in class with tears in my eyes. More of the same, I thought.

Freedom. What freedom? We ate what my mother prepared for dinner or cooked what she told us to cook the way she wanted it done. She even selected all my clothes with little or no input from me.

Freedom. What freedom? I told my mother about a relative’s excessive use of alcohol and I was chastised harshly for talking negatively about the family. When I chose not to socialize with a friend because she had been mean to me, I was again chastised. I shut down emotionally and learned to keep my observations and feelings to myself to avoid her displeasure.

Freedom. What freedom? Without a second thought, I quickly wrote what I thought she wanted in the essay. When the students in the English classes were assembled in the library that next week, my English teacher pulled me to the side.

“Barbara, you didn’t put much effort into your essay,” she said. “Here,” she said handing a second-place certificate to me. She then walked to the front of the library to join the other English teachers and some visitors.

One person, a contest judge I assumed, called a girl to the front and congratulated her on winning first place. I looked at my disappointed teacher and thought, this contest wasn’t about what freedom means to me. It’s about a teacher’s bragging rights of having the winner in her class.

Freedom. What freedom? To write what interests me, to study any subject that interests me, to cook what and how I want to, and to wear whatever I wish are freedoms I don’t take for granted.

First Experience with Mass Effect: Andromeda

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Note:  There are spoilers in this article.

 

Being an avid fan of the Mass Effect series, I had been looking forward to Mass Effect: Andromeda for what seems like forever.  Enough so that I couldn’t resist purchasing the Super Deluxe Edition to get twenty weeks of bonus content for the multiplayer side game.  As with Resident Evil 7 and Dead Rising 4, I was certain that Mass Effect:  Andromeda would not run on the computer I have.  Even more so in this case, since my PC is an i3 with only 6 GB of RAM and Andromeda required an i7 with 16 GB.

I still had to try, if only to cash in on the multiplayer content, but my PC became the Little Engine That Could.  I watched in awe as the game not only booted up, but actually ran without crashing.  I launched the multiplayer to collect whatever booster packs were available – I got an ultra-rare combatant and some nice weaponry in the process – before delving into the main game.  The picture is very grainy and there are a few minor bugs here and there, but nothing that really ruins the overall experience for me.

The story for Mass Effect: Andromeda is fairly simple.  You are playing as Sara or Scott Ryder, the default names given to a set of twins at the core of the story.  No matter which twin you choose as your character, the other still has a role to play.  You are part of an expedition to build a new home for humanity in a galaxy far removed from the Milky Way.  Such a task proves to be a challenge when it’s discovered that an unforeseen calamity has rendered all potential “golden worlds” uninhabitable.  It has also left the space station hub meant to be a waystation for colonists in dire straits.

To make matters worse for Scott or Sara, their twin is rendered comatose and their father, the expedition’s leader\Pathfinder, is killed at the end of the game’s first mission.  The task of finding planets to colonize and thus save thousands of people aboard the space station falls on the shoulders of Scott or Sara.


One of the things I love about Mass Effect: Andromeda is the character customization.  For my first outing, I picked the female Ryder twin, who I renamed as Claire.  The look I chose for her also determined the appearance of her brother and father.  The notion of having a non-playable character’s look be established by what is chosen for the main character is a feature I’d previously seen used in Fallout 4; I really dig the concept and hope to see it utilized in many more video games to come.

My character, Claire, and her father.

Though I had some idea of what to expect from having watched Youtube videos of the opening, I still felt like a out of my element at times.  The first thing that took some getting used to was jumping, particularly over long distances.  The game didn’t offer very clear instructions on how to leap over the more dangerous chasms on the first planet you explore.  I had to resort to trial and error and a lot of failed attempts before I made it across.

The next hurdle was in navigating the terrain.  I got turned around a number of times and was going in circles since there isn’t much deviation in the landscape.  The occasional fights I got into added to my confusion on which way I should be heading.  It’s a wonder that I even made it to a spot on the map where the story would advance.

It took me some time to get through the first mission, but all my roaming still yielded some discoveries about the planet I hadn’t seen in the Youtube videos.  Some landmarks I stumbled across got me inclined to think that this world will be revisited at a later point in the story.

Despite my eagerness to start exploring the next world to potentially colonize, I spent a good deal of time wandering around the space station hub – the Nexus – to talk to people and complete side quests.  After roughly two and a half hours spent “goofing off”, I finally ventured to the area of the Nexus where my character’s personal starship, the Tempest, could be found.  I might not have the best quality picture for the game, but I thought the ship looked beautiful when I first saw it.  In some ways, it looks nicer than the Normandy from the original Mass Effect trilogy.

The game crashed when I initiated a conversation with the Tempest’s pilot, but so far that’s been the only instance where it did.  There was no recurrence of this when I tried it again, so I gleefully surged ahead into the next part of the story.

Exploring the desert planet, Eos, came with its own set of challenges.  Soon after making my way to the planet’s surface, I uncovered a ground vehicle that could make it easier to get from one location to another – unless you’re like me.  As I’ve learned from many other video games that came before, I suck terribly at driving.  This largely led to me spending a half hour doing donuts around the derelict outpost where I found the vehicle or attempting to get up a very small hill with little success.  Part of the trouble associated with the latter was I couldn’t figure out how to shift from four-wheel to six-wheel drive.

After gaining access to and exploring an entire underground vault, I decided to shut down the game for the time being.  Mass Effect: Andromeda was set up so the game could be downloaded at the same time it was running.  I was disappointed when I saw the download, though near finished, had inexplicably halted.  I couldn’t figure out how to get it going again, so chose to cancel and restart it.  This turned out to be a mistake when the download started over from the very beginning.  I was unable to continue my saved game or access the multiplayer side game until it reached a certain point.  My internet connection isn’t the best, so it took two days to pick up where I left off.

As soon as I was able, I accessed the multiplayer game to participate in a few skirmishes.  I had no trouble joining a four-person team, but the load time to start the actual fight was unbelievably long.  After waiting several minutes to join in on the skirmish, I got a message saying my internet connection had been lost.  I subsequently tried a solo run.  While that one did launch after an excessive load time, I quickly got swarmed by the enemy units I was up against.  If that experience taught me anything, it’s to not stay in one spot for the entirety of the fight.

When I was able to resume the main game, I went about establishing a military outpost on Eos to serve as the first successful human colony in the Andromeda galaxy.  I then journeyed to another planet called Aya, where I met with the peaceful alien race, the Angara.  Sadly, this is where my fun came to a screeching halt.  After I recruited an Angaran team member, the game went into an infinite loading screen.  I thought if I gave it enough time, I would be able to carry on with whatever adventure came next.  After waiting nearly four and a half hours, I decided I would have to call it quits.  It appears I will need a new computer if I want to play out the rest of Mass Effect: Andromeda.

Until such time, I am determined to stay spoiler-free on what comes next in the story.  But the game has done such a good job setting up several mysteries with the antagonistic Kett alien race and the underground vaults built by an ancient species known as the Remnants that I will anxiously await the day where I get to see how the narrative plays out.   I can promise a continuation of my impressions of the game when that day comes.

©3/28/17

I Didn’t Know How Special Sunday Afternoon Could Be…

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Sunday, May 7, at 4 o’clock, the Ann Arbor Symphony played its final concert of the season at Hill Auditorium. It was one of their finest concerts! The music was magical. It just carried me away.

 

Arie Lipsky is a wonderful conductor. He knows how to bring the best out of every musician. It doesn’t matter what instrument he or she plays. He seems to know how to reach into each one’s soul and ignite that magic spark.

 

The program opened with the Overture to William Tell and the Overture to Semiramide by Gioacchino Rossini. This was followed by the Opera Choruses by Giuseppe Verdi. The choruses were sung by the Carillon Women’s Chorale, the Livingston County Chorale, the Livingston County Chorale Women’s Chorus and Measure for Measure, the men’s choir of Ann Arbor.

 

The acoustics at Hill Auditorium are perfect. You can hear every note that is played or sung no matter where you are sitting. It was an excellent choice for the performance.

 

The stage is very wide and goes completely across the front of the auditorium. It is a thrilling sight to see the entire orchestra sitting there and then to watch the four choruses file in and stand on the risers behind them. The womens’ choruses filed in from the left while the men’s filed in from the right. It was a splendid sight once everyone was in place.

 

The choruses sang while the orchestra played. The selections were: The Anvil Chorus from Il trovatore, the Gypsy Chorus and the Matador Chorus from La traviata, Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves from Nabucco and the Triumphal March from Aida.

 

After the intermission, the orchestra played Capriccio Italien, Op. 45 from Tchaikovsky and The Pines of Rome by Ottorino Respighi. The music was enchanting and the moment seemed to go on forever and then it stopped. The applause was exuberant, heartfelt and passionate. Everyone felt they had experienced something extraordinarily wonderful!