Thrifty Shopping

The Lucky Dog might sound like a place where Blackbeard or Frodo would pop in for a bite of meat pie and a mug of ale, but instead it’s New Holland’s most cluttered thrift store— where the fine line between antique and junk is thinner than usual.

My friend Melissa and I were out for a day of thrift store shopping, and Lucky Dog was our first stop. Decisions started as soon as we entered the thrift store from a side street— the double doors inside the entrance were plastered with numerous “Keep Out” and “Staff Only Signs”, but the top layer was mostly signs reading “Enter here today”, so we decided it was safe to go in.

“Look, those guys over there are making a video”, Melissa said. We already knew that the Lucky Dog has been well-documented by influencers. One memorable line from Claudia Beiler’s YouTube video describes shopping at the Lucky Dog “like you’re in someone’s closet.”

As soon we entered the room with the furniture, it did seem like a closet. Or an attic. Wooden furniture from rocking horses to china cabinets were everywhere, with only narrow paths to weave through.

Normally, old furniture is not my interest, but since I lately started re-finishing an old desk (I’ll write a blogpost if I get it done), I opened drawers and commented on the wood grain. If I ever want more old furniture to restore, the Lucky Dog might be the place to look.

One piece puzzled us both: a waist-high, dark walnut cabinet with doors that opened to reveal narrow horizonal shelves. Melissa guessed a filing cabinet, I guessed a pie cabinet,but it seemed too nice for either option. A google image search solved the question: it was an old phonograph cabinet, with shelves for records. We hadn’t lifted the part when the player was kept because there was a small rocking chair on top.

Something we both liked was the wooden dollhouse pictured below. It was hard to reach, so we couldn’t see the inside, but Melissa and I agreed it would be a lovely treasure for a grandpa to restore for his granddaughters.

We moved on to other parts of the store where vintage kitchen products and games and toys were. We met other shoppers— the Lucky Dog was having a busy Saturday afternoon. The guys filming were in the video game section. I found a cake pan just like the one Mom used to use to make my birthday cakes. (She has actually still has it.) Stuff from the 90’s is vintage now.

I held up an abacus and told Melissa, “I’ve always wanted to learn how to use one of these.” The black beads of the abacus gleamed. But I put it back when I saw the $60.00 price tag— surely there are cheaper abacuses out there, and would I ever get around to learning how to use it?

Plus, I fear a hoarding susceptibility is in my genes.

My great-grandfather, born in 1898, was a hoarder long before the TV show. He was Mom’s grandfather, and she recalls him as a kindly old man who died when she was a child.

She also remembers helping clean out his home after his death. Just like the Lucky Dog’s furniture room, there were only paths to walk through. His children picked out what they wanted, took seven wagonloads to the dump, and still had enough for a public sale that lasted from nine in the morning to five in the evening.

Packrat Great-Grandpa never drove a car, so much of his hoard came home on his bicycle. At that time, trash heaps, called “dumps”, were a common sight in the countryside. My father, whose boyhood home was several miles away, remembers Mom’s grandfather. “I’d see this old man going past on his bike. We knew he was going to the Voganville dump to get stuff, ” Dad says. “I never dreamed that someday I would marry that man’s granddaughter.”

I tell that story to Melissa as we wander through the Lucky Dog. “Did your great-grandfather live through the Great Depression?” Melissa asks.

He did, of course, and two world wars, and the loss of two wives. He could’ve had worse vices than saving old treasures from the garbage dump.

In the end, we leave the Lucky Dog with only photos.

Our next stops are Community Aid and Goodwill. They are the Wal-Marts of the thrift store world. They smell overpoweringly of detergent, the floors are white and gleaming and there’s plenty of room. Both of them support underprivileged people in the community. (When I lived in Ireland, we called thrift stores “charity shops”.)

Melissa buys some clothing for herself and her husband, a child’s basketball hoop, and a cupcake book. I buy two pieces of clothing for less than ten dollars.

Thrift shopping is a little like honey— you only need a bit! (See Proverbs 25:16).