farmdoc's blog post number 9

Last Saturday Emily sold her carpet on eBay. In January this year Emily – the third of Vivienne and farmdoc’s four beautiful daughters – moved into an apartment she had bought, and discovered, I don’t know how, that under the mint-condition floral Axminster carpet was a polished hardwood floor. So up came the carpet which she stashed in her laundry for several months. But you can’t hide a big roll of carpet in Emily’s smallish laundry indefinitely, and so last week she listed it for sale on eBay. Just before the deadline on Saturday the highest bid was just over a hundred dollars, so she decided to ignore the last few minutes of bidding and await an eBay email telling her the final price. It sold for a few hundred dollars, which amazed and delighted her. So what to make of all this? Importantly the carpet has been given a new life – as carpet and not landfill. But also I think there are some life lessons here: First, only participants can participate. Second, the expected can become the unexpected, and often does. And third, the mundane is not mundane. Oops, I nearly forgot to tell you that Emily’s polished hardwood floor is superb.