Some of my fondest memories of my grandfather are time spent with him at the ballpark and playground at the end of his block, collecting aluminum cans and turning them in at the convenient, nearby, recycling center. Grandpa Paul was a "Picker" before picking was cool. He was the guy that would be up and at it early on the garage sale route, looking for any and every little deal that he would no doubt be trying to sell later at the Flea Market for a reasonable profit.
"Big Paul" played the ponies and if ever there was an anecdotal example of what my grandfather was like..... he found a winning ticket - in an ashtray....not just some small bucks turnover.... a winning ticket to the tune of - "Time to buy a new car!"- and then some!
He was Fred Sanford without the TV cameras.
Another favorite past time of the old man's was to take us grandkids golf ball hunting at the Phillips Park course. I remember climbing in to his old 2 wheel drive pickup and heading out to Aurora's finest public course in search of treasure. The quality time with my Grandpa probably came with a little ulterior motive on his part. Ya see, I'm not sure Paul Sempsrote EVER swung a golf club in his life but one thing's for damn sure, he knew all there was to know about golf balls in the 1980's. Why, you ask...because he sold them as Flea Market fodder, that's why.
That's the thing about these old Pickers - they see value where others don't. They know how to find those hidden gems, items of value to someone - somewhere.
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Saturday morning after hockey practice I sent my boy next door to the outdoor rinks and told him to take a lap and keep his eyes peeled for any long forgotten pucks. With our recent warm up and subsequent snow melt, I had a hunch that the kid would stumble upon a few hockey pucks leftover from an outdoor winter season of practices and games. What I didn't expect was for him to come back with his hands dirty and pockets full, unloading a number of pucks on me and asking to go back out because there were spots that he hadn't yet got to.
After round two Logan had amassed a collection of 18 hockey pucks - to include a Green Biscuit (Retail $10+) and a blue and a green puck to go along with his 15 slightly used discs of destruction. In 20 short minutes my son had found close to 50 dollars in once lost treasure.
And he was good at it too. To illustrate, a teammate had joined him and only mustered 2 lonesome pucks to my boy's 18!
Later, proud of his bounty, he sprung in to the house to tell Mom and pose for pictures. I told Logan about how he reminded me of my Grandpa Paul - a man he never got to meet but had no doubt inherited his nose for value. Later that evening, still high from the hunt, Logan begged to go back and look some more. I'm glad that we did. Not only did we find 5 more pucks but we had some quality time together and it reminded me of Grandpa.
2 comments:
Real nice story Paul. My Grandpa Dinius was the same way, just ask Michele. He would troll around his neighborhood on trash really early and search for aluminum. Chairs, cans, lawn items and bring them home and break them down to take to the recycler. Many times when we would go to their home, he always had "New" lawn chairs. He would simply replace the webbing. I still have 2 of his "New" lawn chairs even though he's been gone for 21 years. I doubt I'll ever have the heart to throw them away. Jeff
That should read "on trash day" really early.
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