Opportunity Outlook (OO) Shop
In 2014, Mary Ann Pellerin retired from being head of the OO Shop – a thrift shop. Janet Jones, the then President of the Residents Association, asked if I would consider taking it over. I agreed to do so if she would relieve me from being the head of the Hospitality Committee. She agreed and on May 1, 2014, I became head. However, Janet couldn’t find anyone to head the Hospitality Committee. So, I served as head of both for about 2 years until Marlane Liddell and Greg Gay relieved me of the Hospitality Committee. I never was very good at Hospitality because I, not being the party guy, didn’t like as many parties as the residents wanted.
Concerning the OO Shop I, with about 50 volunteers, raised about ¼ million dollars during my tenure. Proceeds went to the Residents Association to provide the sole support of its many outreach committees such as drama, flower, hospitality, library, music, the monthly publication The Collingtonian, mentoring at local schools, and more.
Early in my tenure, I was shocked at what was happening with donated clothes. We were getting more clothes, and more clothes, and more clothes and even more clothes. Something had to be done. With the help of a few volunteers, we developed the following.
- Pick out the very best and place them on the racks for sale – probably 10 percent.
- The remaining 90 percent, we put on racks outside in the hall for free. Everyone seemed to love it – especially the cleaning ladies. I fancied that in a week or two, they would end up in a developing country. Wonderful!
- The ones that weren’t taken, about 40 percent, we crammed into big plastic bags. Periodically, Larry Harris, a resident Episcopal priest, would take them to other thrift shops at several Episcopal Churches.
That solved the immediate problem. However, we had about 100 boxes of clothes that had been beautifully sorted by Lillian Langford into summer and winter clothes. Time permitting, these boxes of clothes gradually entered the above process.
At his time, I had a wonderful volunteer, Vincent Johns (husband of Pat Johns) who had been the Dean of Students at Howard University. He was in the early stages of dementia and a first he was hesitant to make decisions. He wanted assurance on nearly everything. Knowing that neither he nor I could make a mistake, he gained confidence and he and we had a wonderful time together.
We had a wonderful nonresident volunteer, Steve Hay, who made my life much easier, especially when it came to physical work. He was the one who introduced us to Dixon’s Auction at Crumpton and sold many of the OO shops’ items there. I believe that he still does. During COVID, Dixon’s put their inventory online. It is fun to view if you are selling, buying or just curious. Its website can be found at https://www.crumptonauctions.com/
Below are a few stories that I recall that happened during my tenure.
- Madame X was accustomed to coming to the OO shop for entertainment. She was very intelligent but quirky. Humble as I am, I say that she was the quirky one – not me. The shop had thousands of paper clips and every day it was getting more. Knowing that they would never sell, I put a few aside for sale and pitched about 2,000 in the large recycling bin. Madame X saw this, said that “you can’t do that” whereupon I said, “I just did.” In a few minutes, I saw the large recycling bin on its side with Madame X’s ass sticking out, gathering up the extra paper clips. I went to her and said, “If you take those out, they are going home with you.” She left with them. Fast forward. Madame X’s boyfriend, on his way to his apartment from her cottage, fell on the ice, broke his back, and died. OO got the contents of his apartment and, lo and behold, got the 2,000 paper clips back again.
- Another Madame X She would stand by the check-out desk and would say to a prospective buyer such things as, “that doesn’t go well with your eyes” or “there is a spot on the collar.” I read her the riot act, after which I felt a little guilty. The next day, driving down Enterprise Road, was a neon sign at a church, in large letters, saying “God is on your side.”
- Donna Gould, one of our faithful volunteers, bought a 2-drawer metal filing cabinet. Don Collins and I delivered it. As I remember, Donna’s apartment was wonderfully mod and full of molded plastic furniture. This cabinet would look terrible in this classy apartment. Instead, Donna asked us to place it in a closet. After we left and were halfway down the hall, she came out and shouted, “I can’t get into my drawers”. Don said to me “this is your problem buddy” and ran – leaving me to get in her drawers. It was easy: push the knob to the right and pull.
- Cross Dresser. Collington had a resident that was a cross dresser. He was discreet about it and wore men’s clothes in public. All liked him. He was a nice man and he bought lots of women’s clothes – large sizes. One day we had for sale a beautiful red woman’s coat. My, but he wanted that coat! He tried it and it was too small. He started taking off clothes and trying again. We felt sorry for him. He was a painter of lighthouses and there had been an exhibit of his paintings in the hall outside of the auditorium. He also painted naked ladies which were hung outside his apartment on the 1st I can’t remember his name, nor do I remember what happened to him.
- Babysitters. The shop served another important function. We were also babysitters. Aides who were hired to help the handicapped, occasionally would bring and park their bewildered residents, in wheelchairs, while they did other things. These bewildered residents seem to enjoy watching all the activity.
- One day Madam Y, brought in a Vietnamese doll, in native dress, about 8 inches high. She said that there was a story about that doll. Her husband had brought it to her from Vietnam where he served in the military. Furthermore, he accused her of giving him the crabs. [1] She told him “You got those from a whore in Vietnam!” Shut my mouth, I had nothing to say!
- Margo Rund was disliked by most. No one had ever seen her out of her mechanized wheelchair, except for the time that she ran it off the sidewalk which then turned over and threw her out on the grass. There are many stories about her that showed why she was disliked; however, this one concerns the OO Shop. To set the stage, the OO Shop had a dressing room in one corner of the shop. Admittedly, as we from Oklahoma would say, “it was put together with chewing gum and bailing wire”. Merritt Edner happened to be in the Shop that day when we heard a tremendous noise. We both rushed to the dressing room to find Margot wrapped in the shower curtains and covered with 2×4’s. She had rammed the dressing room and “Jericho’s wall came tumbling down” around her. Merritt and I moved the curtains and as many boards as we could that were on top – to find that there was another 2×4 wedged between the wheels. She wouldn’t/couldn’t get out of the chair. We couldn’t lift both. Merritt and I decided that the only way to dislodge the 2/4 was to kick it out – which we did with great difficulty. Her parting salvo to us was “I thought I would be here all day”.
- We liked Evelyn Kellman. Besides being a nice lady, she was a hoarder and bought a lot of stuff. One day she bought an electric chair. Steve Hay, a marvelous non-resident volunteer, and I delivered to her cottage. There was no room for it. Steve and I moved all her furniture and finally unloaded it. Shortly afterwards, she called the Shop to say, “it doesn’t work.” We had forgotten to plug it in so told her to do so. Soon we got another call to tell me that it had thrown her out into the room. As I said, she was a hoarded and when she moved to the Creighton Center, her son from California spent a month in cleaning out her cottage – including the attic which residents are not supposed to use. A lot came to the OO Shop. Weeks later, she came to the Shop commenting on the several items that belonged to her, and she wanted them back. We answered, “your son told us you didn’t need them”. She bought a bookcase. When Steve Hay and I delivered it, there was no room for it. I refunded her money and said, “we can’t sell you anything more until there is a place to put it.”
- A son called me one night, saying that his mother had died and that he wanted to donate her clothes to the OO Shop. The next morning, I took one of racks on rollers up to pick up her clothes. The nurse who must have just come on duty, asked “did she die?” Rather than create a bad reputation, I learned to wait at least a day on future trips to the Creighton Center.
In 2017, Karen Boyce, under whose authority I don’t know, decided that a hobby shop should be created. To do so would take a big slice (about 300 square feet) out of the OO Shop, decreasing money-making space, which was the chief source of support for the Residents Association and its many operations. This was demoralizing for me. Coupled with my increasing age and inability to handle things requiring physical labor, it was reason enough to turn over OO and its Advisory Committee to Karen Kirts.
Karen, a retired professional interior designer, was able to take this change with grace and make it look good and less like a junk shop. A win for Collington and me!
[1] Crabs, also known as pubic lice, are usually spread through sex. They like to live in pubic hair and can move easily from one person’s hairs to another person’s hairs when their genitals touch or are very close to each other. Although they’re often found around the genitals, they can live in any part of the body with hair. Most people get crabs during sex, but sometimes they’re spread through other kinds of close, personal contact.
