Once upon a time, my mother and another woman had an antique shop. Mom's specialty was Depression Glass, but she had plenty of other wares and she loved to go to garage sales and yard sales to pick up more treasures.
Eventually, the shop closed. Then for a while, my mother had a booth in an antique center. As she aged and that got to be too much for her, she put her wares on display in a small case in another antique store closer to home.
However, Mom's been rather frail for the past six years. An auctioneer had sold off most of her collection of Depression glass. But she had several large pieces of furniture that she did not need and a lot of boxes cluttering up the basement.
We contacted the same auctioneer who had liquidated her Depression Glass and he set up a date for an auction of my mother's stuff. He took the Victorian rocker, the old-fashioned washstand, the oak server and china cabinet along with a number of ceramic pieces. My mother was extremely apprehensive about the sale.
The evening before the auction, she had trouble breathing. She went to the hospital. She had water in her lungs. Neverthelesss, she wanted hubby and I to go to the auction on Saturday. We did. It was a bittersweet experience to see my mother's treasures on display and it was at times disturbing to discover that some of the things I always considered most valuable went for so little. On the other hand, some items fetched a surprising amount.
In general, the antique furniture did not sell for much. Nevertheless, Mom did have some Hess toy trucks, some Roseville china, a bit of sterling, and one very old souvenir from the 1851 World's Fair which attracted some interesting bidding.
Mom got out of the hospital just as the auction was ending. She was pleased with the total amount of the sale, though disappointed that some of her things did not make more money.
Still, she told me, "See, you should save everything." :^)
