*The story surrounding the second store is still in the works. It's coming. So is Christmas. Don't make bets on which happens first.
Fall/Winter 2015
Work Is Where You Go. Home Is Where They Have To Let You In.
There is never enough room—it doesn't matter if it's the living room crammed with boxes of Girl Scout cookies, the storeroom full of office supplies or tons of books from a buying trip, it's always ten pounds of beans crammed into a five pound sack. Thus I have a long-standing relationship with U-Stor-More (including a special arrangement for 24 hour access so I can sort books at 2AM instead of during the swelter of the day in the middle of summer).
Between the time I decided to open a second store* and the time we actually threw open the doors, a lot of "stuff" had to be done. The location had to be made useable (since I bought the property instead of renting it, the time from the moment I signed the mortgage papers to the point we started making a profit was going to be a dead loss expense)—even with a sharp crew we were looking at a good three months of work… and, given it was the holiday season, weather frequently factored in, turning it in to almost five months. Stock had to be gathered. Before I even signed the papers in the fall, I started off culling from the M Street store and stacking boxes in the storeroom. After a month it reached the point where we couldn't get to anything in the storeroom, so I broke down and started shoving things into the U-Stor locker. Then I lucked in to a ganga deal in Maine at a library sale and filled the storage locker almost to capacity and—due to half a dozen of us doing buying trips at the same time—rented a second locker for the smaller and shorter trips.
With so many people running things in and out, things were shoved higgledy-piggledy in the units. Everyone had been trained to sort boxes by genre before dropping them off so it wasn't too bad to shuffle things around, but it eventually ended up with a marathon alphabetization session in the middle of the collection sessions. I schlepped all the folding tables over to the unit, tagged someone for company and mumbled the alphabet under my breath for six or seven hours while the designated assistant and I took turns running to the all night diner down the street for food and potty privileges.
Since I wasn't the only person with 24/7 access codes, we would periodically see someone else on the lot. A local food bank stored boxes of canned goods and would load up the van every morning about 4AM (their storefront had almost no storage space and their dream facility was still getting funded and might be built by the time we land on Mars). One guy was rebuilding a 1940's motorcycle and sidecar (and management at his apartment house did not allow vehicle repairs on premises). Another tenant made apple dolls and wreaths for sale at the Renaissance fairs and got sick and tired of vacuuming up little bits of dried flowers (and enjoyed the peace and quiet after midnight).
So I wasn't surprised to see the lights on at a new unit. When I drove past the first night, I saw a middle-aged gentleman carefully unloading several bookcases from a U-haul trailer. When Valerie and I knocked off for the night at dawn, he was moving more furniture—a nice magazine table with an attached lamp and a wingback chair and about two dozen heavy boxes. Having done panic moves where I threw everything into one truck, I had to admire his patience. (I just didn't want to pay the mileage for multiple trips. I admit it. I'm cheap.)
We were still playing A-B-C with the books and returned the following night. The lights were on for the new tenant and he had been busy during the day; he had added an upright piano and was now busy sorting through open boxes. (I hoped it wasn't a case of, 'What moron packed my keys/checkbook/tv remote?!')
About 3AM, Chanda (I was trying to spread the midnight shift among everyone at the store—there were a surprising number of volunteers) went on a run to Norma Jean's for a snack for us and when she returned, she had a slightly astonished look on her face. "He's moving in!" She jerked her head toward the new tenant in G-34.
"Good. Putting stuff in storage is a pain in the butt, glad he got it done in two days."
"No, no—I mean he's moving in." When I clearly looked confused, she wiggled her finger in a "follow me" and led me down to the corner. Trying not to be too nosy, I peered around the building.
It was a truly domestic scene. The piano now sat in the middle of the back wall of the 10x10 unit. The boxes were unpacked and the bookshelves—now neatly placed surrounding the piano and covering the rest of the back wall—were filled with properly shelved books. An old wingback chair, upholstered in a dark green floral print, was placed dead center; the magazine table was next to it, with a cord leading up to the ceiling outlet. The new tenant was happily ensconced in the chair, feet up on an ottoman, perusing a book and sipping a drink.
Heck, he even had an Irish Setter snoozing on a rag rug near his feet.
I pulled my head back around the corner. Chanda shrugged. "Sometimes you have to pay for some peace and quiet."
"Just so long as it doesn't turn into Burgess Meredith in Time Enough at Last."
Like 99% of the stories, it's stolen straight from real life. The comment my friend had when we drove past the "living room" was, "Boy, his wife must be a real biatch." And, yes, he even had the dog with him!