the auction gremlin

Cleaning out--the garage, odd corners and under beds where I've stashed things to sell. What to take to the store? Sell in the Etsy shop? Give away?

I've come across a few things I forgot about. Like this head-scratching, what was I thinking of, auction purchase of three heavy wood, brightly painted, semi-marionettish, what? They don't look like they belong in a country house do they? They aren't to my taste at all.

In the throes of auction fever I bid on them. They have price tags on them, so once upon a time they were in a store somewhere. Little sticker tags with big prices. 

Does that say 295.99? Yes it does. And that's just for one. Maybe it's lire or pesos or drachmas, not dollars. I have no idea if they have any intrinsic value or if they are something that can be bought for cheap in their country of origin (Indonesia? Thailand?) and some gift store was pulling a con.

They are made of solid wood and are pretty big--about 20" tall.

The paint looks new, the fabric is new. There are strings you pull to make their arms move.

As I bid, one voice in my head said, they won't fit in your store or house. And another voice, the auction gremlin, hissed you can always give them away, and put her hand up and paid forty dollars for the three of them.

Right now they are wedged in a space between the guest bed and the wall. Which isn't fair to them at all. I have absolutely no idea what to do with them, but they need to go live somewhere else. Have you ever seen anything like them? Do you know someone who would like to adopt them?

how did it happen?

A year ago I had no idea I was going to open a store. My husband and I had it in mind that someday we might open a little business in the Catskills where we have a weekend house, and we even looked into buying a used books store there (Bibliobarn--best used books store ever. Alas, no website, but you can read about it and other great Catskill used books stores here.)

I would need several pages and some therapy to explain why I, who never even worked in a store, now own one. Long story short--I had been doing difficult depressing work for many years (work involving child abuse, mental illness, domestic violence and, well, you get the picture). I needed to do something fun. I only realized that after my best friend and my stepmother, both inspirational women who lived life to the fullest and had fun doing it, died last year. And... I had been collecting vintage art, and my father and stepmother had an antique business so it was not completely unfamiliar to me.  I was looking into taking a space in a coop, when my friends George and Gerry told me they were moving out of the store I'm now in, into a bigger store in the same building. The rent was low, the stakes were low, it would only be open on weekends, I signed a lease last September and opened in October. It's also 240 miles from home so I've put a lot of miles on my car. Man, it happened fast!