Bidding farewell

Packrat? Your mental disorder is ready to pay off

If I told you the alarm on my 15-year-old, Wal-Mart-variety digital clock began bleating at 2:15 in the morning, you'd probably assume one of two things: (1) The electricity had flickered sometime during the night and reset the timepiece, throwing it off from the hour I had intended to arise, or (2) I was taking a disco nap, to rest up for a fashionably late arrival to a warehouse party.

But my neighborhood hadn't suffered a power outage, and anyone who knows me could attest that you'd probably spot me in a police line-up before you'd find me on a dance floor.

Nonetheless, there I was, stumbling out of bed, pulling on a pair of sweatpants and plodding back to my desk to sit in front of my computer — yes, at 2:15 a.m. I had only five or 10 minutes to spare.

I was awake because of a poster. More specifically, a gargantuan black-and-white Johnny Cash promotional poster.

The guy I was dating at the time had stumbled across this oversized portrait of the Man in Black almost by accident.

Though my ex was certainly no stranger to the Internet — he had a DSL Internet connection and maintained his own blog — he had yet to join the ranks on eBay. But one afternoon he had browsed the site on a whim and came across this representation of Cash, and he wanted it, bad.

The seller was restricting first-time eBayers from the auction, and my ex was slightly uncertain about the whole process anyway, so I offered to bid on his behalf.

At that time, I wasn't aware of the software that automates sniping (bidding at the last minute of an auction).

That's why I wound up waiting and watching, bleary-eyed, in the closing seconds of the auction shortly before 2:30 a.m.

I won Johnny for around $50.

I'll be stating the obvious for a lot of people, but I'll go ahead and say it: eBay is amazing.

I will never again look at spring cleaning in the same manner.

A couple of months ago, my parents brought me three or four Rubbermaid containers and two or three cardboard boxes. They were filled with things I, at one time or another, had determined were keepsakes.

Inside one, among the term papers, newspaper clippings and 15-year-old Auburn football programs, were several concert T-shirts from the 1980s.

Don't ask me why I saved them, let alone treated each one like the Shroud of Turin, gingerly hanging them to dry from the shower rod in my bathroom rather than subjecting them to the family clothes dryer.

But God bless the eccentricities of the American teen-ager.

One by one, I've been awarding those garments to the highest online bidder.

Over the weekend, my lone memento of 1988's INXS/Ziggy Marley concert in Birmingham, Ala., went for 40 bucks. In all, during the last couple of weeks, I've made more than $200.

If these people are any indication, eBay is an nationwide addiction. Just ask my mom.

"Hey, kid," she says.

"Hey, Mom. How's the trip?" I ask. I'm at work in Atlanta; she's on her way to Monticello with my dad or headed to the beach at Hilton Head with my nephew and niece.

"We're having a good time. It's good.

"Hey, can you check something for me?"

I groan. "Yep. What am I looking for?"

"I just wanted to see what the bid's up to for some Pennsbury salt-and-pepper shakers. And can you see whether I won the antique lid that ended this morning? I may need you to pay for it with my PayPal account."

I'd like to say I haven't asked her to do the same in return a time or two, but I can't. After all, didn't I need those game-worn jersey baseball cards?

For every instance that I've thinned my piles of junk, whether during a move or when I was fed up with digging through ticket stubs and 18-month-old L.L. Bean catalogs to find something actually important, I cringe at the thought of the goldmine I once had. Gone are the British rock magazines and posters, the Empire Strikes Back trading cards, the Peanuts lunchboxes and the Astros Buddies T-shirts. I try not to even think about the Batman helicopter and action figures, the Tonka trucks and the other toys my younger cousins destroyed when these treasures became hand-me-downs.

So do yourself a favor. Before you throw out that Elvis Presley Dixie Cup, the science project from fifth grade or the plush, green rhinoceros you won at the county fair in 1977, keep in mind that someone out there could be willing to sacrifice money, time and, yes, even sleep to call your castoffs their very own.

Comments

[Steve]

You wouldn't be the first person to use the word "cool" in reference to my parents in the preceding year. Already I've been told two different times that I have "the coolest parents on Earth." Who knew having a son whose childhood would've given Bobby Hill a good run could do that for you?

[Lyle]

I knew your Mom was cool, but not this cool. I can't conceive of my Mom navigating eBay, much less knowing what a PayPal account is and how to use it, although I may be underestimating her (it wouldn't be the first time).

I've bid on a few things at eBay in the past but always ended up losing, and in hindsight that was probably for the best. Have not yet tried selling anything, but as I'm currently mired in some spring cleaning this might be a good time to start.

[Deliverance]

Damn. If I had only kept that Davy Crockett coonskin cap.