Something blue
Nov. 20th, 2004 05:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pecuniumI took part in a dissolution today.
A Friend died recently. She was a friend of Maia's, and tried to include me, when others seemed to leave me out. Regrettably we never got much chance to spend time together, and in the last few months, I didn't intrude (though I don't think Anne would have minded much, but Maia needed the together time, more than it seemed I needed to spend time with Anne, who was dealing with her own concerns).
Today her children started selling off her things. A three story house, small in dimension, large in quantity off stuff. Wonderful stuff, 71 years worth of a life, collected under her roof. Books, glasses, widgets, model firetrucks (she was a great can of fires and firefighters) musical instruments, furniture, jewelry, rocks, tarot cards, games, toys, kaleidescopes, camping gear, art and I know not what else.
My fmaily owns a bookstore. I've been selling books since I was thirteen. I have been a, sometimes more; sometimes less, ative SF fan for the past 25 years. Anne had a a lot of SF. Names I know, people I know. Series I didn't realise I had read so many of (all the Peter Whimsey stories, most of the Darkover stories (up until about '82 anyway). Familiar names; friends. Some of those friends are authors I know well, some are authors of whom I have merely made acquaintance. Lots of those friends were books I know and love. Some of which are hard to find.
Picking through the leftovers of a life tells one a lot about someone. The passions which drove them, the heat of their youth, the mellow coals of their elder years (taken from the age of the books, which is where I spent most of the day, sitting in an upstairs drawing room, reading a Nero Wolfe novel (Father Hunt)and watching people picking over treasures, for sale at 50 cents a piece.
And I saw something ugly. A third year law student, from across the street, was trying to persuade her sons to keep the house, or sell it to him, so it the neighbourhoods demographic could be taken advantage of. There is rent control, but a lot of students. He wanted to manage the house for them, as an upscale tenement. This is a beautiful house, twenties, sort of Calif. bungalow (the area is the West Adams District of Los Angeles) and he wants to get 12 boarders into it, at $750 each, per month.
He spent hours (as he picked through books to resell them, it annoyed me that he got a copy of the Rumpole omnibus before I saw it. I was dealing with SF and didn't get to the mystery room until later) talking this up. Again, and again, from every angle he could see to pitch it.
But, for all that Anne's goods are going to the four winds (which would, I think, not bother her much, so long as they go to people who will appreciate them; and the songs her children were asking were a sort of charity... a futon couch bed for $25) she left a legacy... after he left, they washed their hands of him, not quite shaking the dust from their feet, as Chris put it, "I couldn't do that, I have mirrors in my house."
A Friend died recently. She was a friend of Maia's, and tried to include me, when others seemed to leave me out. Regrettably we never got much chance to spend time together, and in the last few months, I didn't intrude (though I don't think Anne would have minded much, but Maia needed the together time, more than it seemed I needed to spend time with Anne, who was dealing with her own concerns).
Today her children started selling off her things. A three story house, small in dimension, large in quantity off stuff. Wonderful stuff, 71 years worth of a life, collected under her roof. Books, glasses, widgets, model firetrucks (she was a great can of fires and firefighters) musical instruments, furniture, jewelry, rocks, tarot cards, games, toys, kaleidescopes, camping gear, art and I know not what else.
My fmaily owns a bookstore. I've been selling books since I was thirteen. I have been a, sometimes more; sometimes less, ative SF fan for the past 25 years. Anne had a a lot of SF. Names I know, people I know. Series I didn't realise I had read so many of (all the Peter Whimsey stories, most of the Darkover stories (up until about '82 anyway). Familiar names; friends. Some of those friends are authors I know well, some are authors of whom I have merely made acquaintance. Lots of those friends were books I know and love. Some of which are hard to find.
Picking through the leftovers of a life tells one a lot about someone. The passions which drove them, the heat of their youth, the mellow coals of their elder years (taken from the age of the books, which is where I spent most of the day, sitting in an upstairs drawing room, reading a Nero Wolfe novel (Father Hunt)and watching people picking over treasures, for sale at 50 cents a piece.
And I saw something ugly. A third year law student, from across the street, was trying to persuade her sons to keep the house, or sell it to him, so it the neighbourhoods demographic could be taken advantage of. There is rent control, but a lot of students. He wanted to manage the house for them, as an upscale tenement. This is a beautiful house, twenties, sort of Calif. bungalow (the area is the West Adams District of Los Angeles) and he wants to get 12 boarders into it, at $750 each, per month.
He spent hours (as he picked through books to resell them, it annoyed me that he got a copy of the Rumpole omnibus before I saw it. I was dealing with SF and didn't get to the mystery room until later) talking this up. Again, and again, from every angle he could see to pitch it.
But, for all that Anne's goods are going to the four winds (which would, I think, not bother her much, so long as they go to people who will appreciate them; and the songs her children were asking were a sort of charity... a futon couch bed for $25) she left a legacy... after he left, they washed their hands of him, not quite shaking the dust from their feet, as Chris put it, "I couldn't do that, I have mirrors in my house."
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no subject
Date: 2004-11-21 02:14 am (UTC)That's just a wonderful quote.
Why I am I disturbed the thought of people buying books at an estate sale for resale? I'm not bothered by the thought of people buying furniture for resale. Maybe because I think books say so much about a person.
no subject
Date: 2004-11-21 03:09 am (UTC)With about 6,000 books it isn't reasonable to expect them all to be bought for personal pleasure. I just didn't care for him from the get go. Following that with hours of his pitch, well pitch came to mind, and feathers.
TK
no subject
Date: 2004-11-21 02:29 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-11-21 04:31 am (UTC)All this makes me very glad that everything with my grandmother's estate is going calmly with minimal drama. . .at least those who are behaving poorly aren't doing TOO badly, and those who aren't won't fuss over the idiots.
But then it sounds like Anne's family is doing that too -- not fussing over the idiots.
no subject
Date: 2004-11-21 07:40 am (UTC)Money.
no subject
Date: 2004-11-21 10:25 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-12-01 03:21 pm (UTC)That's perfect.