Operating a household to the standards of 1913 means that one is bloody unlikely to find necessary items at the local Wal-Mart.
Not that Wal-Mart isn’t useful. It’s not fashionable, by any means, and the store closest to my house is in deepest, darkest South Baltimore, which means that I get to see an awful lot of fat, unwashed, stretch-panted and inbred people if I shop there. But—it’s unbelievably cheap, and that appeals to Baltimoreans of all classes. I routinely score cheap cat food and ramen noodles at Wal-Mart (actually I think it’s WalSTARmart but I don’t have a STAR key on this computer). You think ramen is cheap at the grocery store? Try Wal-Mart—about a zillion packages for a dollar.
Unfortunately Wal-Mart does not sell antimacassars and place-card holders. Nor do they deal in Limoges, or white damask cloths upon which to set the Limoges.
Since there are no more real department stores in this country (with the possible exceptions of Strawbridge’s in Philly and Marshall Field in Chicago), one must find these things in flea markets and antique shops.
Even more unfortunately, antique shops ain’t what they used to be. Since everyone of my generation is terrified by white damask tablecloths—which denote the table manners that their hippie parents deplored and didn’t enforce—they collect things like Scooby Doo lunchboxes. I know this because I had a Scooby lunchbox in the first grade at St. Alphonsus School. I was overjoyed to see that very lunchbox (well, I know it wasn’t MINE, but it was the same design) until I noticed the $75.00 pricetag. Sweet Jesus. My Mom got that lunchbox for me at Kresge’s down on Lexington street, and knowing my mother, it couldn’t have cost more than three dollars or I’d have been brownbagging.
Today I encountered a casserole dish that matches one of mine. It’s a Super Seventies design that most people really wouldn’t want, but I figured that I could always use another casserole dish. Oops. It’s now “vintage” and was tagged at thirty bucks. Hello!?!? This thing should be in the fifty cent bin at Goodwill! Another dealer—one of those dealers that sticks pink ribbons on things and hand-calligraphs the price tags—rhapsodized over the beauties of a tablecloth. Too bad it wasn’t even old—I have the matching napkins in my sideboard, and I bought them six years ago at Woodward and Lothrop.
I was never adequately informed about the trauma of aging, but going to an antique shop or mall brings the point home rather painfully. It was bad enough to realize that my fraternity’s new pledges were born shortly before I went to college, but it’s horrific to realize that they consider my childhood lunchbox an antique.
And even more horrific that they’d pay seventy-five dollars for it.
Not that Wal-Mart isn’t useful. It’s not fashionable, by any means, and the store closest to my house is in deepest, darkest South Baltimore, which means that I get to see an awful lot of fat, unwashed, stretch-panted and inbred people if I shop there. But—it’s unbelievably cheap, and that appeals to Baltimoreans of all classes. I routinely score cheap cat food and ramen noodles at Wal-Mart (actually I think it’s WalSTARmart but I don’t have a STAR key on this computer). You think ramen is cheap at the grocery store? Try Wal-Mart—about a zillion packages for a dollar.
Unfortunately Wal-Mart does not sell antimacassars and place-card holders. Nor do they deal in Limoges, or white damask cloths upon which to set the Limoges.
Since there are no more real department stores in this country (with the possible exceptions of Strawbridge’s in Philly and Marshall Field in Chicago), one must find these things in flea markets and antique shops.
Even more unfortunately, antique shops ain’t what they used to be. Since everyone of my generation is terrified by white damask tablecloths—which denote the table manners that their hippie parents deplored and didn’t enforce—they collect things like Scooby Doo lunchboxes. I know this because I had a Scooby lunchbox in the first grade at St. Alphonsus School. I was overjoyed to see that very lunchbox (well, I know it wasn’t MINE, but it was the same design) until I noticed the $75.00 pricetag. Sweet Jesus. My Mom got that lunchbox for me at Kresge’s down on Lexington street, and knowing my mother, it couldn’t have cost more than three dollars or I’d have been brownbagging.
Today I encountered a casserole dish that matches one of mine. It’s a Super Seventies design that most people really wouldn’t want, but I figured that I could always use another casserole dish. Oops. It’s now “vintage” and was tagged at thirty bucks. Hello!?!? This thing should be in the fifty cent bin at Goodwill! Another dealer—one of those dealers that sticks pink ribbons on things and hand-calligraphs the price tags—rhapsodized over the beauties of a tablecloth. Too bad it wasn’t even old—I have the matching napkins in my sideboard, and I bought them six years ago at Woodward and Lothrop.
I was never adequately informed about the trauma of aging, but going to an antique shop or mall brings the point home rather painfully. It was bad enough to realize that my fraternity’s new pledges were born shortly before I went to college, but it’s horrific to realize that they consider my childhood lunchbox an antique.
And even more horrific that they’d pay seventy-five dollars for it.
posted by Daniel | 1:12 AM
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