Strange Gathering

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I like to wander into thrift stores now and then, or charity shops, as they're called in England. I know there's something sad about them, repositories for the former possessions of strangers, contents frayed and worn and random. My sister Marlene, who endured kidney disease throughout her too-brief life, declared them musty and depressing. "When I need something," she'd say, "I'll buy it new and choose what I want. My life is dreary enough without adding other people's tired old stuff to the mix."

She could never understand what drew me in.But more than desire or acquisitiveness, what draws me in is curiosity. I'm weirdly fascinated by the arbitrary inventory, by the happenstance convergence of motley things pre-owned and abandoned, an aura of untold stories still clinging to them like dust. I have found a few treasures and bargains in such places, but the truth is I do a lot more looking than buying. For years I used to enter with my mother in mind, in search of some small find that might cheer her up: a doll or a necklace or a nice shirt with big pockets.  In fact, the first time I wandered into a thrift shop after her death, I immediately gravitated towards trinkets and objects that I thought she would like and then backed off with a literal, out-loud gasp as the reality of her absence washed over me again.

Maybe I should avoid such places for a while. But old habits die hard, and last week I ventured into one of the local shops, vaguely in search of a ceramic planter for an ivy plant that's outgrowing its container at home. I figured I might find a fine one here for a dollar or less, and why pay more? And I did find one. But even better, I found a ragtag convention of dolls, some battered by decades, chipped and pale and creepy, some so old as to be antiques, and quite a few of my own childhood vintage. There were baby dolls with weighted eye lids and pre-Barbie fashion dolls missing their high-heeled shoes but forever on tiptoe, and dolls with pouty mouths and torn out tufts of hair.  I took a couple of pictures to send to my childhood friend Carol Bessey...one of them reminded me so much of her doll Ben, big baby that he was, and all of them brought back memories of our doll-playing days on Coney Island Avenue. So it was sweet, yet also poignant. Who would want these orphaned beings? And how did they come to be here?

I asked the lady who volunteers in the shop. She had no idea.

"Maybe someone was a collector, and died?" I speculated morbidly.

"You never know," she said. "As for me, I'm getting rid of everything ahead of time. I don't want to leave a bunch of crap for my kids to have to deal with."

She was not a sentimental type. But she definitely had a point.