Emily Articulated: Estate sale

By Emily Erickson
Reader Columnist

I Googled, “How to organize an estate sale,” staring at my screen as the six-step description bounced off my eyes, not quite penetrating my brain. Blinking to concentrate, I forced my finger to run over Step 1, mouthing the words as I read, “Step 1: Take an inventory of the items you want to sell.” 

Like flipping a light switch, I allowed the scene around me to rush back into focus. Sounds of friends and family unearthing tubs from back corners of closets, running brooms over floorboards, dumping drawers into boxes labeled, “donate,” and water-or-time damaged items into trash bags. Mentally, I added a line item before Step 1. 

“Step Zero: Enlist the help of people you trust, and prepare to be overwhelmed with gratitude for their presence.”

I continued reading, “Step 2: Prepare Your Estate Sale Inventory.” 

Emily Erickson.

Running my hands over the table that once was featured proudly in my grandma’s sitting room, later to be transported to my dad’s, I unveiled a handwritten label. The penned ink read, “Helen Hookstead, 1920.” 

The round, tiger oak piece belonged to my grandma’s mom, and I was struck with how much I’d never know about it. Where did Helen get it? Did she circle it in a catalog before her wedding day or pick it out from a store? Did she rest her coffee on a coaster while reading the morning paper or reserve it for special occasions, only ever laid with her finest china?

I wiped it down before turning to the patterned loveseat, remembering my mom and dad’s heads bent over squares of fabric swatches, holding them up next to the paint cans that would soon cover the walls of our new living room. The paisley they settled on is now faded in the places we used to sit, imprints from years of tucked-under, socked feet; of popcorn bowls, strewn backpacks and curled-up family dogs. I ran the vacuum over its cushions and read on.

“Step 3: Price Your Items.” 

Methodically reaching for the catch-all drawer that used to keep pens and notepads and batteries and lockless keys, I remembered it was already empty. I salvaged a pen from a trash bag, grabbed the stickers unearthed from a rummage sale of old and considered the old camcorder slotted into my hand (remembering when I used to have to hold it with two hands). 

How could I put a price tag on the item that produced home movies, recorded Christmases and cross-country races, and badly choreographed dance numbers for grinning parents? Are these worth anything anymore, anyway? And why does pricing these items feel so much like tainting them? 

I added it to the “free” pile, next to old TVs, blank cards and caseless DVDs.

Continuing, I read, “Step 4: Organize Your Sale and Non-Sale Items.” 

I pulled open a cabinet drawer filled with a family’s history worth of paperwork. A folder labeled, “Death Certificates” was nestled beside “Home & Mortgage,” “Birth Certificates,” “Social Security Cards,” “Titles,” “Credit Card Statements,” “Family Vacations,” “Divorce” and “Medical Bills” — each containing a line-item record of our lives in the house, as well as my dad’s life after we were gone. 

I pieced together the story of our lives as though I hadn’t lived it — every balance statement and partially paid bill like the negative of the family photos populating our albums. Locking the drawer, and sticking a “Not For Sale” note to its face, I read on to Step 5: “Advertise Your Sale.” 

Pulling out my phone, I scrolled through the images of sale items I’d snapped as I cleaned them. Family heirlooms mixed with the tools of my dad’s profession, the sweaters and jackets he used to stay warm, the home goods he and my mom handpicked, and the toys my siblings and I played with when we were kids. I selected “Create Listing” on Marketplace and Craigslist, anxiety and dread rising with every image that finished its upload. I imagined the strangers that would walk through my dad’s house, evaluating the prices stuck to priceless items, seeing bargains or rip-offs in goods packed with memories. I anticipated the messages, the brokering, the haggling and the exchange of money like awaiting an impending sickness, and clicked, “Post Sale.”

Finally, I read on, “Step 6: Make a Plan for All The Items That Won’t Sell.” 

I stacked the empty boxes that will need filling before closing the doors on the house that helped raise me. I let my eyelids fall shut and, amid a room full of people and things, imagined it empty and quiet. Maybe then I’ll have time to say goodbye. Maybe then I’ll have space to let it all go.

Emily Erickson is a writer and business owner with an affinity for black coffee and playing in the mountains. Connect with her online at www.bigbluehat.studio.