Wednesday, February 8, 2012

We ARE the People with the Truck

If you know me, you know that I love craigslist.  That might even be an understatement. 

I periodically find uh-maze-ing deals.  Most of the time I sell kids' stuff we've outgrown, or small items that we no longer use or need.  When we consolidated our homes from two down to one, I sold quite a bit.  I don't make millions, but it takes us to lunch or dinner, or fills the gas tank -- those kinds of things.  I enjoy it because it's like a daily treasure hunt, and I've come up with some pretty cool things -- or at least, cool to us, and you'd never know they were "second-hand" if I didn't tell you.  Which I may or may not do.

Well, Mick and I have been eyeing a piece of Pottery Barn furniture for about six (I just did the math and it's actually been nine) nine years now, and despite my craigslist stalking, it has never once come up in that entire time.  Not anywhere.  (Well, that's a lie; it came up twice in the wrong color in Connecticut, for almost full price.)  Until yesterday.  I found it, about 45 minutes from my parents' house, for an unbelievably great price.

Here's the problem:  there's no one to move it from where it presently lives to my parents' house.  My dad can't move it himself, and even if he could have someone to help him load it from the seller's home, he wouldn't be able to unload it once he got it to my parents' place.  But that's kind-of a moot point, because neither my parents nor my sister (the one who lives closest) have a vehicle big enough for it to fit.  Even if my parents rent a van or a box truck, which is pricey, that still doesn't solve the problem of loading and unloading.

And it's been frustrating, because even Mick has said this would be amazing, and even though we have better places to spend money these days, it would be foolish to pass this up.

And that's when I realized, we are the people with the truck.  We are the people that other people call to help them move.  We are the ones with the truck (and the trailer, and that's been borrowed plenty, and asked to be borrowed even more).  And we almost never say no.  (We occasionally don't let people take the trailer, but that's another story.)  We've helped a ton of people.  Heck, we've even been on vacation and still left our keys with friends so they could move using our truck even though we couldn't physically help them load and unload.

So here we are.  We have a truck -- and a trailer -- about 1200 miles from where they are presently useful, and there is not a soul where we need to be in a position of being able to help us.  Willing, sure, but able?  Not a one.

This stinks.

--Jen

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