The Auction

There was an auction in our neighborhood last weekend. Evidently our town is still considered rural enough to host an occasional auction in the yard. When we first moved here, 24 years ago, auctions were quite the deal- with real antiques, vintage clothing and lifetimes of collecting all going for the highest bidder. Now, with the advent of eBay, rapacious antique dealers and The Antiques Road Show on television, the chance of finding any real treasures is slim to none:

              

The auctioneer was good, 200 words per minute, with humorous bantering between the lots. There just wasn't anything of value to sell! The duck decoys in this bucket were plastic, with what little finish they possessed flaking off:

              

...at least they were already in trash buckets, saving someone the chore of putting them where they belong!

Then I saw a sad lot of fishing gear sharing a box with a ironic iron garden sign:

              

I couldn't help but think of Lennon's lines:

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world... - John Lennon

"...$3 going once, going twice, SOLD! Lot number 42 to bidder 112..."