You left things on the street. You picked things up from the street. It was the New York Ikea when Ikea was still just in Sweden and New Jersey.
Beds, chairs, mattresses, bureaus, shelves, knick-knacks, desks, cupboards, plates, cups, coats, even shoes. Florence had many, many chairs gotten from departing neighbors, Coney Island vendors and street corner garbage heaps. I had many many chairs and surprisingly many many tables from departing roommates, stoop sales and street corner garbage heaps.
But now even if the items are left to be taken on sidewalks or by trash cans, even if there is a note that says TAKE ME, I feel a hesitancy, an embarrassment as it were that thirty years after furnishing my first and only home from the remnants of other people's lives, I am still too broke to buy things new.
In the final sweep of emptying Florence's apartment, things have come in and things now wait to go out, this time maybe to a friend, or neighbors.
Or if left on the street corner, maybe to someone still brave enough to pick it up and take it home.
The cat of course stays.
3 comments:
I so miss getting things off the street. My best furniture was found and dragged, rolled or carried home and frequently used without any need of refinishing. With the bedbug situation in NY, I'm afraid to even buy used things from reputable places like Housing Works, no less take what's left on the street....
But I see things, I see them and covet them. Screw what I can afford, finding them is more fun.
When I was a kid, I wanted to be a garbageman cause you got to get to the good stuff before anyone else....
a friend of mine rode with the sanitation men and oh was there good stuff! including one of the most beautiful leather jackets ever!
I get the best stuff from the street--desk chair-stainless steel dish rack-numerous heavy duty wardrobe poles-leather coat-new- -retro ice cream soda glasses--on and on--digital webcam in original box--
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