Mr. Mary's Auction Barn

Crisp fall days with cerulean blue skies are meant for being outdoors. Today is such a day - gorgeous blue overhead and a kiss of chill in the air that reminds you of tart apples and piles of colored leaves and pumpkins!

In my girlhood, just such days were sometimes spent out in the country at Mr.Mary's auction barn. The barn itself was no big deal. It was a bit decrepit and badly in need of fresh paint. But inside the barn all the excitement of a circus awaited eager young children lucky enough to be taken along.

We always made a day of it. Mom packed a lunch of sandwiches and chips and koolaid (in a red gallon thermos jug). We drove for what seemed hours out into the country side, finally pulling up behind countless others cars parked along the edge of the narrow country road.

People milled about everywhere, from the house and grounds to the barn, chatting and laughing and smoking up a storm. Mom took the babies and younger fry to some shady spot out of harm's way, and we older kids tagged along after Dad as he investigated just what was on the docket to be sold.

He poked through boxes of odds and ends of stuff, leftovers from someone's life that had gone awry or ended. You would find the most unlikely combinations of things all mixed together in the same "lot" as they were called. Kitchen utensils and books and tools and lamps. Nothing made sense about how they clumped things together.

Best fun of all was when the auction began. In the main part of the barn, seated on mismatched and dilapidated chairs, sat the interested parties as Mr. Mary took the "block" and began his strange auction lingo. Mr. Mary was a thin wizened little man who must have been born old. He smoked a stump of a cigar and sometimes chewing tobacco which every now and again he would spit.

I never could understand only about one word in ten, but his singsong catchy rhythms and pitches were spellbinding. It sort of sounded like "I got a dollar, got a dollar, got a dollar. I got a dollar who'll give me two?" said real fast with a lot of other mumbo jumbo mixed into it.

He would point his judge's gavel back and forth, first at one bidder, then another. A slight nod of the head or lift of a finger indicated a commitment to the asking price. How Mr. Mary knew what they meant was as much a mystery as how the bidders had any idea what Mr. Mary was saying!

As each item or lot came out, Mr. Mary would hold up one thing or another, make some small comment, and then begin the song while the bidders began to dance. It was fascinating. Tons of household goods would find new homes while managing not to embarrass the original owners in the least.

If I tired of watching the auction, the lawn provided equally as fascinating entertainment. People of all stations and occupations stood about chatting. Some bought food at the little concession stands, mostly coffee and doughnuts and cider and the like. Dad never bought food there as the price was too much to be reasonable. Whenever we got hungry, we scouted where Mom was and snagged a sandwich or apple.

All too soon it would be time to pack up our little lunch remnants and head for home. On good days, the back of our station wagon would cradle a box or two of miscellaneous stuff. On other days, we carried away with us only the memory of a great day spent in the wide autumn outdoors enjoying the best stuff life could offer.

I am sure by now Mr. Mary has long since passed the way of all humanity. I wonder though if his auction barn still stands and if someone - perhaps his son - may have taken up his gavel to carry on the tradition.