A Tale Of Two Washing Machines...

 Years ago, my wife said to me after I returned from thrift-store shopping with the very item I told her we needed, that when things like that happened, it was fate. It could be a crock pot, or an arc welder, a line trimmer, or a tuxedo...it almost doesn't matter what it was, when I came home with the very thing I told her I wanted to find, she knew. She knew there was some unknown power making possible me to find what I wanted. As if, we put it out into the universe and the universe responded.

We sort of made it a family joke...if I needed something, we'd announce it to the cosmos and just wait.

Funny thing...when you use a home appliance for almost two decades, it's bound to fail, and sometimes those failures are spectacular. Case in point, our washing machine. It's been a workhorse since we bought it eighteen years ago. Almost every week we did laundry, at least three loads. And it worked great. 

But when you hear those gears grinding and it no longer works, it's time. 

A week ago today, my wife and son and I loaded up the van (complete with our dog...) and searched the valley for yard sales. It had rained the night before and storm clouds were still in the sky overhead. We drove to the usual Yard Sale Sign locations and could only find one. We decided to give it a shot since we'd struck out everywhere else.

The yard sale wasn't much. In fact, the woman said she was only putting out a few things to sell because her daughter was having a bigger sale the next day and she didn't want to haul all the stuff over to her daughter's house. She actually apologized for the lack of things to look at.

"Oh," she said. "My neighbor is selling a few things next door. There's a wardrobe, a wood chest, and a washing machine."

My wife, son (not the dog who was in the van...), and I all looked at each other, shocked at what the lady just said. We walked over, checked out the machine, and asked what she wanted for it.

"My ex-husband stored it here and it's been sitting in the garage for a year. He said it worked when he brought it over." The neighbor thought for a moment. "I really don't feel like I can charge you for it since I don't know if it actually works, so if you want it, you can have it."

We were blown away.

We loaded it up, brought it home, cleaned it up, hooked it up, and tried it out. It was a little squeaky, a little buggy (with actual bugs...), but it worked like a charm.

I know putting things out into the universe doesn't happen every time, but last week, it certainly worked.