There is something alluring to me about a country auction. It is hard to explain, but once I was bitten by the auction bug I found myself longing for another one not long after the one I’d just attended was over. My adult life has been cursed with auction fever like many others in my auction travels.
Perhaps it’s that quest for a bargain, or the chance of finding something valuable hidden away in the bottom of the box you just purchased, a real treasure, that causes the attraction. My husband and I were smitten by the auction bug over thirty years ago. He has cured himself from the fever, but I still love to attend a good country auction if the listing appeals to me.
What prompted us to begin attending auctions was my husband’s Aunt Lydia. She introduced us to “auction sales” when we were newly married and needed household items, tools, and all that goes with living in the country. Thirty years ago, auctions were happening in our neighborhood almost every weekend from spring until the cold fall weather in Wisconsin ended the auction season for the most part.
So there we were at our first auctions, watching items coming up for bidding, watching the audience, and keeping our hands in our pockets because we were too shy to make that first bid. Eventually we got up the courage to raise our hands and we began filling up our world at home with everything from a like new velour sofa to step ladders, hammers and silverware. Yep, everything we needed and more seemed to find its way into the back of our old Chevy pickup truck. At times I joked that everything we owned came from an auction except our son.
Our auction adventures have been both exciting and disappointing through the years. I’d say nine times out of ten we didn’t get the merchandise we intended to buy because the bid went too high. And then there are times when we would get an item we never intended to because we were stuck with a higher bid than we ever planned on making or failed to put our hand down in time to quit bidding.
Every auction is different. The success and outcome of an auction can depend on the weather, the size of the crowd, and the auctioneer themselves. And that is what makes a country auction so much fun.
In the pages ahead I have jotted down memories of the auctions that I can’t forget. As the world keeps changing there may come a day soon when the country auction is a thing of the past. My passion is preserving the past so I intend to record here all I can gather from my attic upstairs about my country auction adventures in rural Wisconsin.
SUNSETS
When times are tough,
Just remember that
Sooner or later
A beautiful sunset
Is bound to come your way…
And it takes a few clouds to make it happen.
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