There is treasure to be found in a stranger's yard

The country road tunneled through the woods, undulated over fields and passed by all-but-hidden streams. This morning it brought me to a yard sale.

That was probably what the torn, brown cardboard sign tacked to a stop sign, a few miles back, wanted me to know. Yet the tiny handwriting in pencil was nearly invisible.

On weathered and warped plywood sheets, over saw horses and on blankets spread over dandelions, grape hyacinths and tents of grass blades, were where the wares of the day offered, the sellers thought, at rock-bottom prices.

There was furniture, tables of glassware, piles of “stuff” and patches of “things.” The trail led to the front door of the partial-brick rancher, all but obscured by tree branches, scraggly vines and overgrown bushes.

The clerk in charge was a short, plumb lady with an equally full, round doll face, with small brown eyes and small lips. She wore cut off jean shorts that bore testimony to having been made of strong, long-wearing cotton, so tight they left no room for even a wadded dollar bill or a quarter in snug pockets with frayed openings. She wore a loose green, thick T-shirt with a sagging breast pocket made square by her pack of cigarettes. Her short, curly, course weak-brown hair was tamed by a greasy baseball cap. Worn backward, it rose at the forehead and dipped low at the back of her neck. Yet it was the well-worn red cowboy boots that provided the final fashion touch.

She was arguing with what may have been her sister. She wanted her late grandmother’s “junk” out of the house and out of her life, she fumed. Right away, and perhaps wrongly, I didn’t like her.

All over the yard was the accumulation of a lifetime. Utilitarian pieces, like the vacuum, mops, toilet plunger and ironing board and floor lamps were now, this day, lawn ornaments. Careful where I stepped, I worked my way from the front to the back. There were baskets of old, but virtually worthless, Reader’s Digest condensed books, rickety stacks of vinyl 33 country albums and piles of daily dinnerware, chipped, cracked and lightly browned with cooking grease and cigarette smoke.