How is one person’s junk another’s treasure? You could say that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but backing up one cliché’ with another is likely to have the word police hunt down a writer and slap him silly with a thesaurus. So let’s just say that people have differing views as to what falls into the realm of valuable.

Have you ever driven through the neighborhood on trash day? Very often some piece of discarded furniture will catch your eye. It’s like passing an accident where you know you shouldn’t stare. Human nature being what it is, however, the surplus travesty found can have you envisioning all sorts of things. Inside your head a little voice says “Hey, that would look nice in our pleasure room!” It’s like you see right past the scars and the way the whole thing tilts at a 45-degree angle. You could solve that problem, and nail that sucker to the wall. It’ll be perfect. You can see it in place in your mind’s eye. At times like this someone needs to smack your mind, and put some glasses on it!

Of course, you find the occasional refrigerator, couch, or table that looks in better condition than what currently occupies your abode. It becomes tempting to trade the neighbor’s garbage with your own in-use furnishings. Talk about curbside appeal! No one wants to negotiate with the trash man to keep it from his clutches. Trash-men are sort of like mail delivery folks. They have their appointed rounds, and some customers even give them Christmas cards. Grab that three-legged table from the trash pile as he’s reaching for it, and you might have a skirmish on your hands. No one wants the embarrassment of negotiating with the sanitation engineer. After successfully bargaining the item from the grips of the city dump wagon, how tacky it is if you are seen smuggling refuse from someone’s heap, and lugging it up the street. It’s better to wait for midnight, to make your move on that glorious early American replica, yet legless foot stool. Not to worry, you know the perfect place for it!

Many times before these cherished pieces hit the street an owner will try to unload it at a yard sale. Another favorite American tradition; this display of “crap I no longer want” can be found in most towns and cities on any warm Saturday morning. Of course, there are quasi-professional consumers that attend these functions. They scour the classifieds, and pay close attention to telephone-pole-sign postings of such impending loot free-for-alls. You’ll know a pro because they are the ones that show up considerably earlier than the start time listed on the yard sale announcement. Usually seasoned yard sale shoppers are eyeing the goods as the owner is still in “set-up mode,” or for the real hard core early cases, while the seller is still in “wake-up mode.”

When a purchaser finds something they want, it’s no matter to them that they are there before the sun comes up. Even if the owner is in their bathrobe they start in with the inquisition. They ask questions like a drill sergeant at Paris Island inspecting new recruits. So many questions are asked that the annoyed owner offers them the family heirloom armoire for a buck ninety-eight just to shut them up, and move them along before the bulk of the crowd really shows up. What the heck, they’d like to shower and have breakfast before the long day of selling anyway. These early shoppers are usually the persnickety type; sort of like your Aunt Bernice! She’s your parent’s sister who is always snickered about at the family function by those gathered in the kitchen while she is creating more controversy at the dinner table. These experienced yard sale folk want to out-do the average schlub and grab up all the good trash before the rest of us get there to find even slimmer pickins.

The dregs of the yard sale usually end up in the last round-up where the trash truck has it in its sights. Still, if it piques your curiosity there is no telling to what lengths you’ll go to have the neighbor’s selected cast-off replaced by your own reject at your own curbside.

Of course, there are many times when roaming through the housing development you’ll see something and say “Geeze, can you believe the Joneses had such a dilapidated relic on display in their showplace of a home? It looks so bad that it could belong in our house.” Usually you have such a high opinion of the Joneses and their mantle boasts picture-perfect smiles with an appropriate portrait fitting of being on the cover of “Life” magazine. These two beautiful people with four lovely children have make-up and style down to the quintessential art form. It makes the rest of the neighborhood look like a gang of refugees from a third-world nation who has just arrived via a garbage scow.

Nevertheless, it is in their hideous reject where you could conclude that this glimpse of reality proves that they are no better than you, at least beneath the surface. In fact, that couldn’t possibly be true. They have their groceries delivered, drive fancy cars, and don’t pick through other people’s garbage. Their discards are usually the treasures for the rest of us. For them the sky’s the limit. After all, one man’s ceiling is another man’s floor.

Look out! I hear the waffling sound of a word police thesaurus being aimed at my noggin.

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Giosue’ Santarelli is a prolific political columnist, humor columnist, and feature writer who has been scribbling for nearly 40 years. Visit his humor column website “The Devil’s Advocate” at www.devilsadvocate111.blogspot.com.