From This Valley

By Pete Steiner

Garage sales and car shows

We had a neighborhood garage sale. Somebody wants what you no longer need or have room for. It’s an imperfect mechanism of commerce. If I move 10% of my display, I figure I’m successful. The rest you haul to the thrift store or pack up to seed the next garage sale.

As I move that old Twins’ yearbook back to the basement, my wife asks, haven’t you tried to sell that at least four times? Just need to find the right buyer, I reply. Besides, you need to give at least the appearance of inventory. (I ought to be in test trials for a new drug we’ll call “LeTergo.” Pronounced, let-er’-go. A new anti-hoarding medicine.)

Garage sales are all-American mixers. A lot of people just want to breeze through and see if there’s anything they want that they can get cheap.

“I’m looking for a rolling pin!” one woman laughed.

“Good luck!” I called as she moved on.

Some people do want to socialize. We were all still recovering from 15 months of pandemic isolation, and people were ready to mix as humans are prone to do. Topics were light: the Twins, the weather. I wasn’t the only one who had not mowed in weeks. People were wondering if 2021 could be a reprise of 1988 — it had been so dry! Could this be another generational drought year?

Maybe we were good luck. The next day it poured. was, let’s just give them away, but the 6-year-old was already reaching for her little purse.

“A quarter,” I said.

“Which one is a quarter?” she replied, fingering her coins.

This one. Learning to be an astute consumer, an early lesson in capitalism. Really. Kudos to their grandmother for giving them a little financial freedom.

A woman about my age came by. She told me she was embarking on a new exercise program to stave off diabetes, walking every day, cutting down on sweets. I told her I admired her determination. Somehow, she brought up how she had loved cooking for her husband; I asked if he had died. “No,” she said, and began weeping. He is in a care facility now with Alzheimer’s. He had been a successful businessman and wonderful husband, and now there was nothing either he or she recognized in each other. We agreed, it’s a most cruel disease.

A young woman furnishing her new apartment came by. She liked some cut-glass items. They had been my grandmother’s and I had not wanted to part with them, but Jeanne convinced me. They would have a new home with someone who appreciated them. Then the deluge arrived; we scrambled to get everything back under cover. Some clothes out on racks in the driveway got drenched. We shut down early. Nobody complained. We needed rain far more than a few extra garage sale bucks.

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On that second day, there were two girls, maybe 4 and 6. They liked a pair of tiny salt shakers, which I have to admit, were kinda cute. Jeanne said her first thought

Car shows are as symbolic of a Mankato summer as sweet corn and swimming pools. The Cars of Summer, lovingly restored classics, make the rounds of various roll-ins so us gawkers can behold.

Though not a “car guy,” I admit I was wowed when I went to one of the twice-monthly Saturday events at Unique Classic Cars, now in the old Lowe’s location on Bassett Drive. The business’ name is overly modest. The largest classic car dealer in the Upper Midwest, they literally sell all over the world. Inside the vast showroom are 150 pristinely restored vehicles.

The background music was Patsy Cline as I got a chance to talk with CEO Jeremy Thomas. He says he never considered himself a “motorhead,” but after he began selling new cars at 19, Thomas decided to open a classic car business. In 2006, he had just seven cars on a modest lot on Highway 22 south of Mankato. Now, explosive growth, barely slowed by COVID (many of their clients shop via the internet), has necessitated creating a logistics position just to oversee shipping to unique destinations such as Iceland.

Among the most eye-popping vehicles inside: a 1963 Corvette, perfectly restored to “Bloomington Gold” certification. A consignment car, its price is also eye-popping: a cool quarter-million. Thomas says it will sell to the right buyer. Also check out Johnny Cash’s last Lincoln, a black custom 2001 Town Car that Jeremy, a huge Cash fan, bought for himself at auction in Arizona.

As summer draws to a close, there are only two more chances to take in the Unique roll-ins: Sept. 11 and 25. (By the way, if you’re passionate about cars, they are hiring for sales and restoration work.)

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