Greetings, friends. Today the estate liquidator got started on the house in earnest.
I say “in earnest” because, actually, Brian the Liquidator got started on Saturday morning, so hot was he to trot. He originally wanted to come at 8 a.m., and I was like, hell no, after last week, I am sleeping in. The garage is open, help yourself to the garage.
I padded out to the kitchen to make myself coffee at about 10 a.m., and the garage door was open and I could see that the garage was already mostly empty.
I grabbed a pad of paper and a felt-tipped pen and wrote “DO NOT REMOVE” in large letters, over and over, once per sheet, and took some gaffer tape and started sticking the handmade signs on things. The dining table my father made. The two cabinets in the kitchen with the cast iron pans and all the food I’m still eating and enough dishes and flatware to eat it with. The refrigerator and the stove, so help me God, but not the washer or the dryer.
I taped one sign to the treadmill upstairs. I hung one sign on door of the bedroom I’ve been sleeping in, because I didn’t want the bed or mattress walking off, and I hung one on the door of the bathroom because I didn’t want my razor walking off again.
I taped one on the door of the library, because we hadn’t finished going through the books and papers, and I’m still using it as an office. I wrote the words on a pair of 3x5” cards and taped them to the lamp sconces on the walls of the dining room, because they are the only sources of artificial light in that room.
Most of all, I taped one to the door of the bedroom in the back where Adah and I have been hoarding all the family photos and keepsakes.
I let Brian into the house, and I showed him the signs on the various things, and reiterated our understanding of what was to be removed, and what was not, which rooms were ready for removal, and which were not quite ready. He eagerly nodded in agreement, a coil of breathless energy.
“One of my guys is coming,” Brian said. “I want to show him a few things.”
Fine, I said, and went back to doing a final pass of the kitchen. Brian’s associate came over. I overheard them talking in the living room, which was one of the rooms that I had indicated was ready for removal.
“Yeah, this is all mine,” I heard Brian saying. “I bought it already.”
The words sounded funny to my ears, and very far away. What he said was technically true — we did have a handshake deal that gave him ownership of the remaining contents of the living room. It just sounded strange to hear it said aloud. To him, it was another day in a particularly entertaining freelance career.
To me, it was… all of my late mother’s stuff. Former stuff.
I came into the dining room to find Brian opening the door to the bedroom, the one with the “DO NOT REMOVE” sign, to show his associate the furniture within that, yes, we had agreed he could have.
I fidgeted while they stood there for a moment, and the guy allowed as how he wasn’t interested in the highboy or the dresser, and then gnashed my teeth when Brian opened the door to the library, and showed his colleague the bookshelves and said, “See anything you like? Help yourself.”
We had agreed that Brian could have most of the books, but the remainder of my mother’s clothing history books were still on that shelf. I resolved to take Brian aside when his associate left, and reiterate our earlier conversation. I suddenly had to pee. I stepped into the bathroom.
I had no sooner unzipped my fly than the door started to open. You know, the door with the sign saying “DO NOT REMOVE” on the other side.
“Excuse me,” I said in a loud voice.
“Oh, sorry,” I heard Brian’s associate mumble from the other side of the door. The door closed hastily and I heard them wander off.
It was clear that there was nothing dishonest about Brian, nothing at all. In fact, I am glad we just pulled the trigger and hired him, rather than dithering around trying to get quotes from the maybe two or three other people in central New Hampshire who do this kind of work.
It’s just that the man is an agent of chaos, but it’s the restless ADD kind of chaos, not the evil kind. I suspect he would not get far in his line of work if he wasn’t this way. Anything I’ve specifically asked him to do or not do, he’s done, and quite cheerfully.
But Adah and I had tried to avoid having strangers tromping through the house looking for price tags. We hadn’t said that to Brian, for whom anything he can sell out of the house is one more thing he doesn’t have to lug away and sell elsewhere. So here we are.
“I’m sorry,” he later said to me. “Usually the houses I work on don’t still have people living in ‘em.”
You see? I actually do trust Brian, who was, as you may recall, a total stranger just a few days ago. And now he technically owns most of what’s left of my mom’s stuff. However, I am less certain about his associates, even though they are probably just as friendly and honest and upfront as he seems to be.
Nevertheless I went and got the felt tipped pen and went around to the door of each room with a “DO NOT REMOVE” sign and added the words “STAY OUT”. Just to be sure.
I have more of this story to tell, but not tonight. If you are reading, I send my love. Ceterum censeo pro vigilum imperdiet cessandam est.