4 - Friday, September 6, 1991 - North Shore News

A lesson in how not to get rich quick

THIS STORY explains why I will never be rich. Also why, as a consolation prize, I may never be wise either.

Last week my wife decided to dispose of our sofa. I say “*dispose of’? with my usual care. She first tried to give it away. And on this point | was wiser than she.

I told her no charitable group — not the Salvation Army, not the group for the mentally handi- capped that phones us regularly — would take it. They have a long experience with picking up seven- ton objects fit only for the less discriminating junkheaps.

So, having failed in our charity, there was nothing for it but to try to sell the thing. |! placed an ad that began: ‘‘Giveaway prices,"’ listing the sofa and one or two other items.

The sofa’s price was $25. Let me say that the decision to part with it had touched off a sinall dispute, low on the Richter scale of domestic arguments, but enough to rattle a teacup or two.

1 thought we could find a place for it somewhere in the house. My wife didn’t. It was a struggle of wills. Ha. And a second ‘‘ha.’’ Suffice to say that the ad quickly appeared ip the paper.

The sofa was, by the way, no piece of junk. True, the covering had come away from the frame at a couple of places along the back and side. But a staple gun would fix that.

True, too, the children had div- ed into it like the sea from time to time. But it was presentable. Good enough to grace the living room of my good self for maybe a dozen years.

Anyway, 2 couple of students quickly showed up to look it over. Both from Toronto. One attend- ing UBC, the other Langara. And both taking phys-ed. Handsome, strapping girls, i’d call them.

It was clear at once that they

Trevor Lautens

GARDEN OF BIASES

wanted to buy the sofa. And at the advertised price of $25. But, being the super-salesman that [ am, and having some idea of stu- dent finances, | said firmly:

“We'll give it to you for $10, and that’s my final offer.""

They accepted. And they said they were moving into an apart- ment the next day and they'd rent a van and be back to pick it up in two days — Labor Day.

But a couple of minutes after they left, while [ was con- gratulating myself on my business acumen — the sort of thing that would he the envy of a Jimmy Pattison — the doorbell rang.

It was the girls. (I did not check to see if they were women. They looked young enough to qualify as girls in my eyes.)

They had car trouble. The rear window had mysteriously shat- tered -— a puzzle worth a column in itself.

If it rained in the next day or so, the back seat — and a lot of their worldly goods, jammed into

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it — would get soaked.

That was unthinkable. So I told them to back their car under my carport and — well, wouldn’t anybody do the same? — borrow my car.

They said thanks, and off they went. Hell, it’s my commuter car, and 1 wouldn't be driving it till Tuesday.

They reappeared the next day. Which was, thankfully, dry. 1 presume they took their stuff to their new apartment.

The sofa was still in our living room.

The following day they were due to come back in their rented van. Bet, um, did | mention that I'd said to them: ‘‘Look, if you can’t rent one, maybe you could borrow my GMC van?"'

No, | haven't mentioned that.

The phone rang Labor Day morning.

The girl who owned the car was on the line. They'd tried to rent a van but couldn't, so could they take me up on my offer?

An hour or so later, after I'd cleaned the van’s innards and all four of us having wrestled the sofa out of the house, they were on their way in my van.

Have | explained they also had to pick up some furniture at IKEA, as well as cart the rest of their goods to their apartment?

I didn’t. Well, they did.

After they left, | began, slowly, thinking.

Let me see, said I.

They had not yet paid us for the sofa. A measly $10. They’d borrowed my car for a day. Now they were using my van to move to their new place, around 49th and Victoria in Vancouver, and, oh, yes, to run out to IKEA in Richmond.

Obviously, they’d burn more dollars’ worth of my gas than i'd get for the sofa. Then there was our free labor and inconvenience. it occurred to me that this wasn’t

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the way Jimmy Pattison earned his millions.

Did [ mention that.my wife threw in an armchair, gratis?

I didn’t. She did.

The truth is, ! began to feel an- noyed. i speculated that these two girls (from Toronto, remember — probably Rosedale) came from pretty privileged backgrounds.

Their fathers maybe were law- yers in seven-piece suits. The girls perhaps belonged to a class, and a generation, that was more than a little spoiled.

Come to think of it, they had expressed a damned sight less gratitude than { would have in their place.

Did they, in fact, take us for suckers? Old fogies that they, with their upper-middle-class ways, could casually exploit?

At such times, I begin to think rather badly of the hurman race. ! usually react to this by going to bed. Which I did.

I was gloomily reading when my wife came into my bedroom half an hour later and handed me $30. Silently.

“What's this?" said 1, ever original.

“From the girls,’ said my wife. “They tried to give me $50."”

‘CYou didn’t take $30!" I cried (adding, to myself, ‘‘from those poor, handsome, strapping girls’’).

“They absolutely insisted,’’ said my wife, she who is not casily thwarted. ‘“‘They were both very firm. — and very grateful.’’

} turned crimson with shame at my recent ungencrous thoughts shout them. In fact, such was my remorse that I thrust the $30 into my wife’s hand.

To top it off, when 1 drove to work in the car ! had lent them, I discovered they’d ieft money in it too, with a note explaining that they'd tried to put gas in it but couldn't find the key to the lock- ing gas cap.

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Boy, { hate it when people do something that restores my faith in human nature.

Did I mention that they were handsome, strapping girls?

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