There is a post to be written about going to garage sales. My wife and I have been Saturday morning “salers” for 20-odd years and the stories we have accumulated match the plethora of things we have found for sale on people’s driveways. And there is a real dynamic to garage saling, something you learn over the years as you deal with sellers and the various reasons they have things for sale; as in those who expect to make a pile of money versus those who just want to get rid of things. Some people like to tell you how much they paid for something when it was new in an effort to get you to pay top dollar. But I always say that once you’re done with it and it hits the driveway, the item is only worth what I am willing to pay. Others you run into just don’t wanna take the stuff back in the house and so they offer it for peanuts. All this means that, over the years, I have reluctantly paid too much for something I really wanted and other times I have walked away shaking my head, having scored something I was thrilled to have found for next to nothing. I feel like it has all balanced out and often it is more about the hunt, anyways – just seeing things from your youth, for example – and the gamble you take, the unknown, when you roll up on a sale where you may find just a pile of junk or maybe a rare treasure. And sometimes it is about the story; the tales of the experiences you have with the people and the things that you find. Here is one such story that will resonate particularly with my fellow Elvis People.

It all happened at the end of September, a Saturday late in the season that had no business offering up so many yard sales. One that was listed on social media noted that included among the items for sale was records and this excited me. But that can also prove frustrating when you consider that sometimes a record dealer or shop owner will see that listing, get to the sale at the crack of dawn or the night before and buy up all the stock leaving us simple collectors high and dry. But this September morn we arrived before the albums had been bought up. The first little alarm bell went off when I noticed the the older woman who was having the sale had divided the records up by price point. This always indicates that the person thinks that the albums have a perhaps greater value than they actually do so instead of just saying that the records are a buck or two, they have decided that that one is just a dollar but this one here, well, that one is five. And they may be right but, after all, this ain’t no store – it’s a garage sale.

Anyways, there were good titles there, I give her that and I grab seven LPs that total $60 according to the stickers on the jackets. One is the North American – or red – version of the Beatles’ A Hard Day’s Night that had a $25 sticker on it. I understand it’s the Beatles but the record was not in great shape. As I walk over to her little cash-out table, I notice on another table the Bruce Springsteen live box set that consists of five records that she was only asking $20 for. The final indication that this woman was maybe off her rocker was – in yet another location – the Beatles’ “White Album” with a sticker on it that said $75. That’s seventy-five dollars, an absolute ludicrosity. I put the records on her table saying “I have $60 worth here. Would you take $50?” but instead of answering she asks to see what I’ve got and starts adding them up as if she didn’t believe me. She hems and haws, says the Hard Day’s Night is “worth more than that” but then agrees to the fifty. I’m disgusted with her at this point and tell her I’m putting the Beatles back; I wouldn’t take it from her as a gift now. In Elvis terms, she had Double Trouble and Pot Luck there. I’m trying to collect all of Presley’s records on vinyl and I keep the list of what I already own with me. These two I needed and so I bought them – $10 for Pot Luck and $15 for Double Trouble. Whatever, lady.

So, I had what I figure was first dibs on these records and I picked up some good ones but the experience left a sour taste in my mouth. This is the one extreme of yard saling – dealing with people who make you feel like they have the upper hand and then over-charging you. The other extreme, though, was yet to come and this story has a happy ending. A Happy Elvis Ending.

We cruised through a few more sales with not much love and then we were on our way home. Then we saw a final yard sale that hadn’t been listed online or with signs. We pulled up. Junk. The house was junky and they had nothing much of any quality for sale. But there was a big cardboard box of compact discs and I start to digging. The old woman on a scooter says these were her daughter’s boyfriend’s who had died. I was happy to find some interesting titles, with some being quite odd to be finding at such a sale held in these sketchy surroundings. While I am barely even familiar with the album, I have now bought Bruce Springsteen’s Letter to You three times; once on digital, only weeks before this sale on vinyl and now I found it on CD. I also found a 3-CD set of David Soul (2 CDs too many?), a Lorne Greene compilation and the Beach Boys’ Stars and Stripes album. These last two and The Essential Jerry Reed are in and of themselves HUGE finds for me so I was very pleased. Funny but the lady on the scooter had said while I was digging that the CDs were 25 cents each. Minutes later, the daughter walks up and asks me what I think they’re worth. My wife chimes in with “25 cents – like your mom just said!”

I’m just about done when I spot a familiar face on a box lid at the bottom, buried. I felt like Indiana Jones when I pulled this out.

In 2016, RCA released The RCA Albums Collection; “This 60th Anniversary 60-CD Deluxe Edition celebrates RCA Victor’s signing of Elvis Presley. It features all of the albums Elvis recorded and RCA released in his lifetime: studio, soundtrack, and live”. I open the lid and all these wonderful little cards and pictures tumble out, all reproductions of things that would have come with the original albums. I see a 300-page hardcover book and the spines of all 60 CDs. My eyes glaze over and I think I actually blacked out briefly. The mother and daughter have been hovering over me while I scrounged and when I pull this box out they register surprise – “Elvis!” – not having known anything about the contents of this box of CDs, obviously. The women are oohing and ahhing and then the daughter plays her hand. She says –

“Oh, that one is ten dollars. That is ten dollars.”

I bust out in a sweat and start grabbing frantically for my wallet. “Oh yes”, I say, “that is ten dollars!” So with that and the handful of other CDs I figured twenty and before anyone could pump the brakes I handed over the money and everyone seemed pleased. Except me. I was way beyond just pleased.

These things are changing all the time but when I got home I looked The RCA Albums Collection up. This substantial collection was originally issued in very limited quantities – they made X amount of them and then stopped, meaning this is “discontinued”, unavailable. It sold initially for $400 CDN but now that they are no longer being made the ones that are out there go for bank. If you want to buy one, you can. On this day, I found one – count ’em, ONE – in the entire world of Amazon and it is yours for $741.80. There were some to be found on eBay – TWO, exactly. One for $794 and one clown had taken 15% off, he says and he’s come up with $1402.91 for his. All this means that I would never have ever owned this or even considered buying it had I not found it at a garage sale. Not only was I never going to pay $1400 for this but owning it was never even on my radar, even when it was brand new and “only” $400. Therefore, this exceedingly cool item has never really existed at all for me. Like Indy’s lost ark, it had a mythological aura about it and one could even wonder if it existed at all. At the sale, I was preparing to decide how much I would be willing to pay for this. It’s comical to recall that when I heard her say “that is ten dollars”, I was happy to agree and quickly threw the money at her. Dang, that was easy, she must’ve thought, I got what I asked for.

There was something else in this cardboard box. I wasn’t exactly sure what it was but I grabbed it. The discs were loose and all over the place but I collected all five of Presley’s The Essential 70’s Masters box set. This package looked different from the one I owned and I wondered if it was an alternate edition. Once I got it home and looked it up I learned that it is the exact same as the “long box” I already own except in a smaller package. So, I guess I’ll keep the one I already have as it “matches” my 50s box and now I have something of some value to either sell to the local record store guy or bank some store credit with him. I therefore bought something I already own but it’s all part of the adventure.

Did I rob them? Well, the things I bought were not theirs to begin with, for one thing. And they had no idea what was in there, they hadn’t checked. If they had hoped to make money by selling something in the box that had value, they would have looked through the box and maybe priced things accordingly or posted them online. In the end, they seemed quite thrilled to have made some money – they had not much worth buying there. It’s not as if I am now going to sell this collection and make the pile of money that they could have made themselves. Not that I was willing to leave it behind and tell them to post it online, anyways. I’m a nice guy but… And in the end, you all know me – am I not someone who should own this treasure? Does it not makes sense that this happened?

I got home and my wife and I checked that all the CDs were there and they were. I see I own 12 of these albums on CD already and so I can maybe get rid of those – but I am keeping my two copies of From Elvis in Memphis because I so love that one (I now own 3 CD copies and one vinyl). Gradually I will work my way through and listen to all 60 which will be great fun.

The day started with some twit tryna sell the White Album for SEVENTY FIVE DOLLARS – at a garage sale! – and ended with me scoring a rare gem for a sawbuck, ten Loonie dollars. This surely makes up for the times I feel I’ve overpaid. And now I’ll have many new Elvis albums to listen to for scores of Elvis Weeks to come. It truly was a garage sale miracle. Thank you, King. Thank you very much.