When I finished my masters in 2012, at age 29, I found a job in Oregon. My wife and kids and I were living in Minnesota and it was going to be a huge move, halfway across the United States. We had a yard sale before the move to get rid of some old crap.
Now, having a full time job made me feel a little more grown up, and I had a desire to let go of the past. I added punk band memorabilia to the sale: t-shirts, belt buckles, pins, and patches. And as I dug out these things, I also dug out my old CD collection.
I stopped attending concerts shortly after my first child was born, but I still had my music. Hundreds of CD’s that I stored in a large cardboard box in our garage. I collected them before I got married, some of them before the internet. They represented hours in used music stories searching through CD racks to find obscure punk bands that I’d heard rumor of, but never listened too. They represented punk shows at sketchy venues: bowling allies, abandoned warehouses, and bars, where I’d purchased the album from some drifting skinny roadie.
They were the tangible evidence of a cool and rebellious life before I became a buttoned up husband and father.
I cracked open the box, rooted through it for a bit. And suddenly I felt the need to add it to the sale. It seemed like a symbol. I was growing up, and in the moment it felt right.
I put it in the yard with a sign on it that read, “CD’s $1 Each.” I thought to myself, I might sell a few albums. Probably just the trendy stuff. It’ll help out the family and lighten the load.
I left the yard sale for a moment to get something from the car. We lived in a town home and I often had to walk a good distance to get to the parking lot. I was gone for about ten minutes, and when I came back my wife, Mel, said, “ I sold your box of CD’s.”
She didn’t say it with spite, or anger. She didn’t say it like she’d won a huge victory. She said it innocently. She said it with a hint of compassion because she knew how much they meant to me.
“I hope that’s okay,” she said.
I felt a deep hurt in my heart. My hands started to shake a little. I didn’t know what to say, so I said the obvious. “How much did you sell them for?”
“Ten dollars,” she said.
My knees got weak. I wanted to yell at her. I wanted to say, No way! You sold all my punk albums for ten dollars? Do you know how long it took me to find those? Do you know what they meant to me? Do you even care about my youth?
But I didn’t because I was reminded of when I was thirteen years old. My older brother, Ryan, and I went to a yard sale and found a box of records. A woman, probably in her mid 30s, was running the sale. She had bangs with an 80s style perm. The records were mostly White Snake, but there were a few Clash and Black Flag albums.
We bought the whole box for a few dollars. Ryan balanced it on the handlebars of his bike so we could get it home. And as we road off I could hear a man yelling angrily in the background, “You sold all my White Snake Records!”
He yelled it a couple times. His voice had a southern twang that only amplified the pain he must have been feeling.
Ryan and I started riding faster. It was probably the woman’s husband, and I recall thinking that he sounded pathetic. He sounded like some loser living in the past. I even said to Ryan, “That guy needs to grow up.”
Flash forward 15 years and suddenly I was that guy, angry because his wife has sold his youth. Instead of yelling at Mel, I went in the house, sat on my bed, and placed my face in my hands. I wanted to cry, but I couldn’t muster the strength.
This is one of those not always discussed parts of adulthood. Sure, having kids, buying a house, finishing college, all of that is part of it, but another huge part is sliding into a pair of slacks and a work polo. It’s buying a minivan even though you look like an old fart, but it is, without a doubt, the most practical way to get your kids around town.
This part of adulthood looks like yoga pants and crocs on a Saturday grocery shopping trip. It looks like fitting the part. It looks like letting go of those silly things you thought were so cool as a kid (your CD collection, your prom dress, your punk jacket) and looking and acting like a nerdy 30-something husband and father.
Mel walked in after I’d been in the room for about 20 minutes and asked if I was okay. My anger was gone at this point. I didn’t say anything.
She sat next to me, put her arm around me, and told me she was sorry. “It’s cool,” I said. “It was time.”
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