sold off in three rings

On Saturday I went to the home of a man who thought he might live forever.

I was there because he was wrong.

I didn't know him, nor anyone in his family, nor did I talk to anyone who knew him but I could tell that he thought he would never die.

How?

By the amount of stuff he had piled into his shabby brick two-story.

There is no other explanation.

All the wood parts on the house were years past needing paint and so too the garage. Just the sort of job a handy man might tackle, you would think.

You would also think that someone well equipped with tools would probably be a handyman. This is not always the case, sometimes they are former handymen.

But a handyman craves tools even if he doesn't always use them and this fellow indulged himself right to the end.

I was there for an estate auction. I saw dozens and dozens of hand planes, nothing wrong with that, I know lots of collectors with more, but these seemed more gathered than collected. Dozens of electric drills and circular saws were there, far more than one man could have a use for.

There was a nice table saw in the basement, and three more in the garage.

There were enough yard tools for a dozen homes. But the yard showed little work. It did show three additional sheds and a tarped pile of wood.

There was more there than one man could use in a lifetime. Hence my conclusion that the fellow thought he would never pass.

There were hundreds of books. There were boxes of unused hiking boots. There were six or seven bikes, none working. A fiberglass canoe, an aluminum row boat. Dozens of hand saws, all dull.

There were three old cast iron light poles laying on the ground.

Here is the moral of the story.

Because he was a man who had tools rather than a man who really used his tools he was unable to pass on to his family the importance of those tools.

They were just things to be sold off in three rings on a warm Saturday in January.

You can get a lot done without very many tools and people will appreciate your work.

People will not appreciate your things.