From the Jaws ...

I'm not exactly a glass half-full girl, nor am I traditionally half-empty.  But these past couple of days I've gone beyond the latter into (as the Big Lug puts it) "someone drank my f***ing water."

For the second Saturday in a row, hunting has yielded mostly practical - a fabulous cache of clothes for Princess (eight wonderful new things for $3 - including shoes), two drums (one djembe-style and one ashiko) for Acid Trip ($20 - the ashiko needs work but it's gorgeous), various toys, and a Rogers 1847 silverplate box (in great internal shape).

I did find a few Bunny things, too.  The stuff on the left is 14K (I love earrings that are true pairs instead of two of the same), and that on the right is sterling.  Actually, the ones with pearls are duplicate to a pair I own already.  Maybe that's why I recognized the gold when the marks were so obscured.  And the enamelled locket is cool, too.  Total spent - $3.10.  Return on that is (minimum) $22.  Not a bad day, right?

Yet I'm managing to yank that victory and shove her intothe jaws of defeat.  Why?  At both places in which I got the gold I heard the same apologetic phrase - "really picked over."  I suspect I only got those earrings because the markings were mangled.  And I can't seem to let the "what if?" go.

What if I'd been there just a few minutes (or an hour) earlier?  What if I hadn't stopped to talk to a neighbor at one of the tables?  What if I hadn't been wrapped up in my own thoughts as I began this sale or that sale?

What else did I miss?

Argh!  I took Saturday mornings off to have fun, not to count grams of gold!  Or regrets.

God, I'm so neurotic.

This will not happen next week.  I have an appraisal for my inherited pieces (and my fabulous finds) on Tuesday.  No matter what he says, I won't let it be the gold star I crave, or the black mark I fear.  This is - or should be - independent of my personal foibles.

In the meantime, I need to brush off Victory and put her back in her place of honor.  She deserves it.  Even this weekend.