Dear Marge,

I was unsurprised to read in Friday's Grand Rapids Press that your shop, Marge's Donut Den, made the list of finalists for the Celebrated Service Award.  

Marge's Donut Den enjoys a faithful clientele.
Courtesy: Marge's Donut Den

My natural inclination toward frugality only allows a donut when the neon Krispy Kreme sign beckons with the offer of a free one. I haven't partaken in ages, though, because five bites of pleasure fail to outweigh the embarrassment of taking the freebie without further purchase, violating some unnamed principle of thrift. Despite rarely eating anything I haven't bought in bulk and cooked in my own kitchen, I visited your shop a couple of years back, discovering that your donuts shame Krispy Kreme's, in both size and taste.

In 2009, a friend received a diagnosis of terminal cancer. Pam sold online, specializing in American Girl dolls. American Girl on clearance means an item's imminent retirement. So, each year she'd purchase discontinued goods at a steep discount, storing them to resell at Christmastime when demand peaked. Pam stayed home with her girls. Selling on eBay made a great home business, and supported her daughters' American Girl doll habit.

I wrote about Pam in a recent blog post.

Whenever I'd see Pam at church, we'd catch up, often recounting recent bargains (Pam loved Goodwill.com), and celebrating notable sales in our online shops. So, when I learned of her diagnosis, making a meal or sending a card didn't spring to mind (I'm horrible about sending cards), but She needs me to sell her things did.

I picked up a carload of dolls and doll outfits, along with other odds and ends she'd been intending to list, and helped organize her storage room. If I were ill, I doubt I'd want a pity party, and I sensed Pam didn't either, so we went through household detritus, thankful for the attention the task required. I enjoy decluttering, sometimes overreaching my bounds in impassioned attempts to persuade a friend to part with a worthless bauble. Pam required no coaxing, though, unwilling to burden her husband with the flotsam that had drifted to the corner of the basement.

Custom baby clothes quilt,
available on Etsy from another
seller.

Pam opened a giant Rubbermaid tote and fingered a baby outfit, remarking wistfully, "I planned to make a quilt from Ava's things, but now I'll never get to." We both cried. Our church had a quilting group, and a few phone calls found a sweet woman--aptly named Sugar--eager to tackle the project that Pam could not. People from church brought meals, took the girls to music lessons, prayed, and supported the family in myriad ways. A line from a sermon that touched me deeply shortly after learning of my own son's autism diagnosis comforted Pam, too: "This is not all there is." Yet, even if there were no hope of the resurrection, the loving embrace of a church family in a time of need is no small matter.

My and Pam's church, LaGrave CRC
in downtown, Grand Rapids. Courtesy:
Panoramio.com

But Marge, what you did was no small matter, either.

I administered Pam's eBay account, but, overwhelmed by the number of American Girl Bitty Baby outfits and despairing they might not all sell online before Christmas, I cast my net wider, placing a free ad in the Grand Rapids Press. But the first caller wanted a doll, not just an outfit. And I received just one other inquiry, and that was from you, Marge, also wanting a complete doll for your granddaughter. When I explained my motive for selling, you asked, "How many outfits do you have?" Then, undeterred by the quantity, offered, "Take them down to Marge's Donut Den. I'll buy them all." You hadn't even wanted one outfit, let alone a whole pile of them.

So my friend Tammy and I headed to your shop with the outfits, stopping at every thrift store on the way (I like to combine trips, and always need more inventory for my vintage kitchenwares shop). You were gone, so your sister called you to authorize the purchase. Along with the payment, you had her include two gift certificates. While we waited, we enjoyed free donuts your sister proffered. We didn't feel embarrassed to get these freebies, however. While Krispy Kreme offers gimmicky bait with the expectation you'll take a dozen home, or at least buy a coffee, you treated us as if we had done you a favor, not the other way around.

Courtesy: Women's Lifestyle

Torn between wanting Pam to know you cared and not wanting her to feel like a charity case, I opted not to tell her why you bought all the outfits. She appreciated the gift certificates, and insisted I keep one. A few months later, Tammy and I made another thrift store run, picking up a dozen donuts with the gift certificate en route. I don't want to admit how many we ate (I really love apple fritters), but, while we savored them in the parking lot of the Goodwill Outlet, a life-worn man loaded his purchases into the bed of a rusty pickup. I rolled down my window. "Would you like a donut?"

Perhaps donuts engender trust. After all, you believed my story about the outfits, enough to spend quite a bit to bless someone you didn't even know, and the man in the parking lot threw caution to the wind, eating a donut from a pair of strangers.

I really hope, Marge, that Marge's Donut Den wins the contest. I've read on the Celebrated Service Award website testimonials from others whom you have helped, and I'm sure my story won't surprise your regulars. You inspire me to give my best to my own customers, and even to those who may never spend a dime.

I'm more of a procrastinator than a card writer, which I realize is a poor excuse. But here's my shamefully belated thank-you. Pam thought perhaps you were crazy, buying all those outfits. When you're so giving that people wonder, it speaks volumes.

I don't know if big donuts make big hearts, or if big hearts make big donuts, but there must be a correlation. There must.

Love,

Laura

P.S. I'm asking everyone to vote for Marge's Donut Den for the Celebrated Service Award. I can't imagine anyone deserving it more than you.

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For Richer, For Poorer

Mom favored character-filled houses
needing a little TLC.

The child of a Realtor who didn't believe in day care, I visited many houses in my formative years. Sometimes I'd stay in the car, bickering with siblings, singing, reading, or inventing playful limericks; sometimes I'd play the junior agent.

My mom catered to the down-to-earth, homeschooling types; few others would tolerate her entourage of children. While she sacrificed the more lucrative clients, my mom ingratiated herself to others, many whom she still considers friends. Some of them even attended my wedding.

Touring houses with a frugal mother and equally frugal buyers, I developed an eye for latent possibilities in properties others would pan as 'dated' or 'dirty.' And upon discovering a house full of vintage character, if we had opted to wait in the car, Mom would call us in to admire the natural woodwork, built-ins, or original retro kitchen.

Being a professional bassoonist was my
top career choice, though I would've
settled for selling real estate. Somehow I
ended up selling vintage kitchenwares instead.

As a youngster, I might've been an agent myself. I'd peruse the day's new real estate listing cards, setting aside those I deemed especially well-priced. My mom required that I answer the phone, "Shilto residence, Laura speaking," which felt embarrassingly grown-up; but before acquiring our first answering machine, I fastidiously took client messages, sometimes attending to simpler queries. In high school, while my band director tried to dissuade me from a bassoon performance major, I balked, figuring I would sell real estate if my music career faltered.

Calin and I, in front of the Eliminator, about to
leave Michigan for Omaha. I wish the photo
showed the pinstripes and "Eliminator" decal

I landed a performing job, though. With ink still wet on both bachelor of music diploma and marriage certificate, my hard-won position as bassoonist in the Omaha Symphony took me and my new husband to Nebraska. We arrived in a pickup truck borrowed from my parents: a small Chevy S-10 emblazoned "Eliminator," over a flourish of zig-zaggy pinstripes. It overflowed with all our possessions, covered in a big blue tarp secured with clothesline. (Fifteen years later, my dad still drives the Eliminator, though the doors are about to rust off. They would've already, had he not jerry-rigged the hinge with a wind chime).

If showy rock stars occupy one end of the musical genre and wage spectrum, classical musicians in regional orchestras crowd the other. This didn't discount home ownership, though--not for the resourceful daughter of a real estate agent. We house-hunted in a fashion learned from Mom and her thrifty clients. Our Omaha agent spent the first day showing bi-levels in suburbia. We had to set her straight, knowing our preferred aesthetic more likely involved estate properties on city lots rather than newish houses with fake stone façades and particle board cabinetry.

Calin scrapes petrified carpet
padding off the floor, after having
removed the green shag carpet.

Having moved to the city with our lives' possessions and nowhere to go, we experienced homelessness, but without the stigma. We needed an inexpensive fixer-upper--preferably with a mother-in-law unit to help cover mortgage payments. In a two-day whirlwind of showings, we settled upon a house that Thelma's heirs itched to unload, one with a tiny upstairs apartment boasting a separate entrance. Though the two-toned shag carpet in the living room begged removal, I loved the 1940s chrome-trimmed range with built-in tick-tock timer, and bathroom featuring clawfoot tub and never-say-die linoleum.

Enjoying a meal at the A-Ford-O Motel.

Unable to close immediately, we lodged at the A-Ford-O Motel. Judging from the motley furnishings, owners Tom and Rita Ford valued thrift over fashion for their roadside inn. We enjoyed satisfactory in-room meals, considering the limitations of our vintage Sunbeam electric skillet, avoiding restaurants that would've drained our scant resources. For entertainment, Tom Ford offered free video rentals from the motel office. The Field of Dreams VHS cassette we borrowed still bore its garage sale price tag.

Calin futilely attempts rust removal
on our ugly Chevy Celebrity. This
photo does not do the car justice.

My mom drove the Eliminator back to Grand Rapids; we car shopped. A Chevy Celebrity for $700 promised more than it delivered. As I balked at the smell of stale tobacco smoke, sagging headliner, bad stabilizer bar, and a spot near the headlight callously broken to create easier bulb access, the car's owner adjusted the price gradually downward, determined to turn looker into buyer. I drove the over-loud eyesore four years, without a single breakdown. Though its ugliness once provoked the question, "Was your car vandalized?," I loved the old Chevy. I sold it to one of my bassoon students when we moved back to Michigan, for a mere $50 less than the $450 we had paid. What it lacked in aesthetics, it boasted in reliability, besting the so-called "good car" we received as a wedding gift.

I and my Heckel bassoon enjoy a meal in
our retro kitchen. This photo graced a page
of the Omaha Symphony cookbook.

Even in the cheap motel, cooking out of an old electric frying pan; in our fixer-upper house, baking in a vintage 1940s range; or navigating the grid-like streets of Omaha in a humble Chevy which could dethrone the ugliest car in almost any lot, those were happy, hopeful times.

Leaving our house for the last time,
ready to move back to Michigan.

I learned what's nice. It's not room service at the Marriot, or a new McMansion with stainless Viking appliances. It isn't a shiny Audi with heated leather seats. Niceness to me is durability, wrapped in thrift, adorned with humility--just like a rusty Celebrity that refuses to give up; antique linoleum that celebrated its dodranscentennial before we ever arrived; a motel that loans garage sale videos, daring its guests to dream big; or a little old bungalow that housed two newlyweds, leaving them richer when they sold it--in dollars, in memories, and in thankfulness. And enjoying, like so many of my mom's dear clients, unpretentious blessings with someone you trust--for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer--without a Jones in sight.

But godliness with contentment is great gain. 1Timothy 6:6
He is rich who has few wants.--proverb

Next up: A post my sister deemed to personal for my blog, but it struck a chord with readers: City Girl, Country Girl 

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City Girl, Country Girl

Entering the building for the first time, I tripped, dropping the pencil case I had fashioned from a watercolor paint box. Clearly an inauspicious start to fifth grade, my hopes to be as popular at the new school as I was unpopular at the last were dashed, along with my No. 2 pencils.

The fixer-upper we bought when I was a
kid. It looks like it could stand to be fixed
up again.Courtesy: Google Maps.

My parents chose the school for its status as the cheapest private school in the area. We drove from city, through suburb, to country to get there. We planned to build a house, but when our home sold too quickly, we purchased a fixer-upper in a hurry--a house chosen for its money-making potential rather than its excellent public school system.

Shy in social situations, I found making friends difficult. So I sat on the step at recess, secretly annoyed that they recited the jump-roping chant wrong, yet longing for an invitation to join in.

Manure, just right for pelting your
friend. Courtesy: Newsvine.com

Johnna took initiative, and I accepted an invite to her dairy farm. Mortified by her proposal of a manure fight, I declined to participate. Only as an adult, scooping manure to fertilize our garden--and paying fifty cents per bucket for the privilege--did I realize she wasn't referring to fresh manure, but rather, the composted variety--clumped grass bits bound with what looks like dirt.

The following Monday, Johnna reported the social faux pas. My city ways didn't pass muster. Ostracized for refusing to sling cow dung, years later, my dad put it into perspective: While teaching, he heard of a kid, taunted, because his firefighter dad perished in a blaze. I won't repeat the wording, lest it haunt you as it has me. As I recall my first year at the new school, I shed no tears. But I weep inside for a boy, who, in his moment of greatest need, experienced cruelty rather than compassion.

My fifth grade teacher (I could inject "bless his heart" here, but won't) took me out of class one day, a few weeks into the school year. The aide admonished my classmates to include me while the teacher assured me that Lisa would be my recess playmate. She was--for a few days. Walking back into the classroom following the 'be-nice-to-Laura' lecture remains my life's most humiliating moment. That the teachers were trying to help provided little salve for my embarrassment. I chose to homeschool, partially, because of my experience.

Our back yard.

For years, I replayed this in my mind. As an adult, I live just a few blocks from the Raymond Avenue house where I resided while attending the country school. I love my neighborhood, and hope never to leave. We have an extra half lot, cultivating more garden than grass. When people ask, their eyes glaze over before I'm half-done reciting all the herbs, vegetables, and fruit we grow. We pickle, dehydrate, can, freeze, brew vinegar and beer, make wine from our own grapes, cook everything from scratch, compost, forage, and--aside from being poultry-free--run what might be considered an urban homestead. We buy raw milk, farm-fresh eggs and local honey. I keep meaning to learn soap- and cheese-making.

Recently I googled Johnna. She runs an online store, like I do. She's a homesteader. She teaches classes on making cheese and soap, and foraging wild herbs. She homeschools.

Oh, my. She could be my friend.

Here's Johnna. Doggonit, I even owned
the same dress. Courtesy: Publicradio.org.

Here I am, picking blueberries.

If only I had more initiative, I'd pick up the phone. Maybe it's not too late to have that manure fight.

But I know myself too well. I still bear the social reticence that kept me a fifth grade outsider. So I'll pick up my No. 2 pencil instead, and write how I now realize perhaps Johnna and I are more alike than different. The city girl can befriend the country girl.

Children grow up, and time turns manure into soil.

Next up: An unlikely piece of '80s nostalgia brings back more memories than you can imagine: A Tinful of Memories

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Giveaway for "The Complete Tightwad Gazette"

Today my dad and I went to several antique malls and thrift stores. I spent most of my time looking for vintage kitchenwares, but when I saw the blue binding of The Complete Tightwad Gazette by Amy Dacyczyn as I walked down the aisle, I swooped in and nabbed it--just so I can give it away!

Here are the giveaway rules:

You get entries for each action. Important: Log your actions in the RaffleCopter giveaway form at the end of this post.

*Visit Laura's Last Ditch and tell me what you see that your mom or grandma has (or had), by posting a comment on this blog post.(2 entries)

*"Like" Laura's Last Ditch on Facebook. (2 entries)

*Read any of the stories here at Adventures in Thrift Land, and leave a comment telling me what made you chuckle. (2 entries)

*Tweet about this Tightwad Gazette by Amy Dacyczyn giveaway:  "Complete Tightwad Gazette Book #Giveaway @http://adventuresinthriftland.blogspot.com/ #tightwadgazette #thrift #frugal"(2 entries)

*Follow Adventures in Thrift Land, by clicking "Join this site" in the right hand column of this page. (3 entries)

*"Like" Adventures in Thrift Land by clicking the "Like" link below (3 entries):

*Add Laura's Last Ditch to your Etsy favorites. (5 entries)

Important: Log your actions below. You can do as many or as few as you'd like, for the number of contest entries indicated.