The Husband decided to part with some of his automotive memorabilia…finally.
And he decided to do it in a sensible way: sell it at an automotive rummage sale. Car freaks who want to buy stuff come and talk to car freaks who are selling stuff. Hopefully, the sellers walk away with less stuff and some money, while the buyers take home more stuff to throw in their garage/attic/spare bedroom, and never look at again.
I’m good with this idea, as long as The Husband does not come home with more stuff after selling his stuff. And he didn’t. The problem turned out to have nothing to do with car bits on this particular day. It was the weather.
By Florida standards, it was freezing. Sunshine State – check. But no amount of sunshine brought the temperature up to anything remotely resembling weather I wanted to sit or stand around in and sell old magazines, posters, books and a set of wheels.
Now, I am an understanding sort of person. When we got married, I knew what I was getting into in terms of the cars. The Husband has always loved cars, owned some great ones, taken care of them himself, even raced some of them. Our honeymoon was nonexistent – we spent the weekend following our wedding at a racetrack: he was driving and I was the crew. But I was fine with that.
Over the years, we have been at tracks in blazing heat, bitter cold and pouring rain. Hours and hours, day and night, working the track together, or him driving and me working the track. After he stopped racing, I figured I’d caught a break, finally. Fewer miserable long days outside, not to mention finally giving the UPS guy a break from delivering boxes of car parts. Poor guy was here so often, the neighbors thought we’d adopted him.
Today was a reminder that marriage sometimes requires you to sacrifice comfort and convenience for one another, regardless of whether there is a reward for doing so. It’s the little things, like sticking price tags on books, and remembering to bring the tape and pens, that make it work. Same thing in a relationship; the big jobs matter, but the small, everyday tasks and efforts are what keep a household running on a practical level.
Oh, and the money made at the sale wasn’t bad, either. There’s a big auto parts swap meet coming up soon. Wonder how much more stuff I can convince The Husband he doesn’t need anymore?
Notes for My Next Life 
My husband is a car nut too. How I wish I could get him to part with just a little bit!
Oh, yeah! Mine’s just as bad, but he limits his collection to old car RADIO bits and pieces. He repairs them for car nuts who want the original old radio to work, and since they don’t make things like tubes and vibrators to fit 40’s and 50’s cars any more, he’s gathered hundreds of old carcasses just in case they might have a part he can use. I wonder if there’s any chance . . .uh, what kind of cars does your hubby collect, and do the radios work?
He does not really collect cars, per se. He buys, drives and eventually trades or sells. He drove Porsches for many years, and has driven most of them at this point. Over the years, he’s been to shows and collected the books, bits and other stuff, and now there’s just no room in the house, and zero ability to store anything on the property. Good thing, too.