There's an old hot-rodder's saying that covers this issue:
"If you can't eat it, save it."
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So trivial, yet it really ticks you off.
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"If you can't eat it, save it."
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There are online marketplaces that cater to people with more money to throw around than most all of us mere mortals ever will. Chairish is one; 1stDibs is another.
I don’t object to the existence of such “resources.” High-end interior decorators spending their well-heeled clients’ money have no need nor desire to pass their days scouring estate sales and remote antique malls in search of bargains.
What’s objectionable is the person who thinks his swag will fetch anything remotely approaching 1stDibs asking prices. (Asking prices as opposed to actual sales prices.) Some relative newbie to the antique/vintage scene living in Bozeman thinks the chair he got from his recently departed grandmother’s estate is worth $5K because one “just like it” is listed on Chairish for even more than that. That’s just fine, really. He doesn’t know better, and people aren’t born knowing this stuff. But when people who do know better politely tell him he’s not likely to get even a fourth as much he takes offense and gives them an argument.
I have the original artwork for a cartoon that appeared in the New Yorker in 1973. I got it for 10 bucks, framed and ready to hang. I told the junktique peddler I bought it from what it was and that it was likely worth considerably more than that. She let me have it for 10 bucks anyway, seeing how I was a reliable customer and how we liked each other well enough. (She had a jealous boyfriend, though, and he resented me.) I sent photos of it, with a ruler laid next to it, to the original art department at the NYer. The helpful woman there informed me of the issue and page number where it appeared. She told me that if she had it she would price it at $2,200. But she added that it might not ever sell, for that or any price. Realistically, she said, it might bring $200 at auction, so less than a tenth as much.
I don’t object to the existence of such “resources.” High-end interior decorators spending their well-heeled clients’ money have no need nor desire to pass their days scouring estate sales and remote antique malls in search of bargains.
What’s objectionable is the person who thinks his swag will fetch anything remotely approaching 1stDibs asking prices. (Asking prices as opposed to actual sales prices.) Some relative newbie to the antique/vintage scene living in Bozeman thinks the chair he got from his recently departed grandmother’s estate is worth $5K because one “just like it” is listed on Chairish for even more than that. That’s just fine, really. He doesn’t know better, and people aren’t born knowing this stuff. But when people who do know better politely tell him he’s not likely to get even a fourth as much he takes offense and gives them an argument.
I have the original artwork for a cartoon that appeared in the New Yorker in 1973. I got it for 10 bucks, framed and ready to hang. I told the junktique peddler I bought it from what it was and that it was likely worth considerably more than that. She let me have it for 10 bucks anyway, seeing how I was a reliable customer and how we liked each other well enough. (She had a jealous boyfriend, though, and he resented me.) I sent photos of it, with a ruler laid next to it, to the original art department at the NYer. The helpful woman there informed me of the issue and page number where it appeared. She told me that if she had it she would price it at $2,200. But she added that it might not ever sell, for that or any price. Realistically, she said, it might bring $200 at auction, so less than a tenth as much.
Tiki Tom
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I am still having difficulty accessing FL. It is taking a very long time to load. Any updates about solving this problem?
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In recent months I’ve heard on a few occasions young people bemoaning the “gerontocracy.”
They got a point, to a point. Our elected leaders, especially at the federal level, do indeed skew considerably more senior than the population overall. No need to rehash the embarrassing “senior moments” we’ve witnessed from elected leaders on both sides of the aisle.
And I’ve read thoughtful and provocative perspectives on public matters penned by people who might reasonably expect to still be here 50 years from now.
But it’s downright offensive, this notion, as I’ve heard expressed a few times, that older people don’t care about what the world will be decades down the road because we won’t be here to deal with it.
I’ve found just the opposite to be true. We oldsters tend toward greater concern for the future than we did in our younger years. We tend to be less impulsive and more deliberate. And we give greater thought to the effects of our actions on others.
That’s true of most people I’ve known for half a century or more. Yes, I know, there’s no fool like an old fool (I have the misfortune of being related to one) but on balance the counsel of elders is worth seeking out, you twerpy little know-it-all.
They got a point, to a point. Our elected leaders, especially at the federal level, do indeed skew considerably more senior than the population overall. No need to rehash the embarrassing “senior moments” we’ve witnessed from elected leaders on both sides of the aisle.
And I’ve read thoughtful and provocative perspectives on public matters penned by people who might reasonably expect to still be here 50 years from now.
But it’s downright offensive, this notion, as I’ve heard expressed a few times, that older people don’t care about what the world will be decades down the road because we won’t be here to deal with it.
I’ve found just the opposite to be true. We oldsters tend toward greater concern for the future than we did in our younger years. We tend to be less impulsive and more deliberate. And we give greater thought to the effects of our actions on others.
That’s true of most people I’ve known for half a century or more. Yes, I know, there’s no fool like an old fool (I have the misfortune of being related to one) but on balance the counsel of elders is worth seeking out, you twerpy little know-it-all.
LizzieMaine
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I've known young geniuses and old idiots, and vice versa. If there's a fallacy that the young fall into it's forgetting that the world they know right now isn't the world they're going to grow old in -- and the biggest fallacy the old fall into is believing that somehow they can turn back the clock to the world they knew when they were eight (and nobody really understands the world when they're eight.)
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^^^^^
As I’m sure I’ve mentioned before, the people of the “Greatest Generation” I knew well enough to say I knew, rarely pined for how things were when they were young. Perhaps misty-eyed nostalgia is a luxury reserved for those who have never known true hardship.
As I’m sure I’ve mentioned before, the people of the “Greatest Generation” I knew well enough to say I knew, rarely pined for how things were when they were young. Perhaps misty-eyed nostalgia is a luxury reserved for those who have never known true hardship.
Agree completely...
My parents and their friends never pined for the Great Depression and a World War. As far as I could tell they were quite pleased that things were mostly peaceful and prosperous in later life.
Tiki Tom
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Sort of in the same vein: earlier in the week I was given quite a lecture by a 24 year old regarding the state of the world, what needs to be done, how we should think, what pronouns to use, etc etc.
I wish I could be around in 40 years when some pampered kid with no life experience gives him a similar lecture, based on the updated mores of the year 2063.
I wish I could be around in 40 years when some pampered kid with no life experience gives him a similar lecture, based on the updated mores of the year 2063.
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^^^^^^
I’ve heard it called “presentism,” which I suppose is close enough.
I had an online exchange with a fellow regarding the Ken Burns documentary “The American Buffalo,” which aired in two two-hour installments this past Monday and Tuesday. The near extinction of a species that once numbered in the tens of millions (it was estimated that the total population was down to fewer than a thousand individuals at the end of the 19th century) and along with it the human cultures dependent on the animals is stunning in its scale and speed. I offered to this acquaintance that had he and I been around 150 years ago we might well have seen such destruction as the natural order, how things ought to be, manifest destiny and all that, as did most Americans back then.
I’ve heard it called “presentism,” which I suppose is close enough.
I had an online exchange with a fellow regarding the Ken Burns documentary “The American Buffalo,” which aired in two two-hour installments this past Monday and Tuesday. The near extinction of a species that once numbered in the tens of millions (it was estimated that the total population was down to fewer than a thousand individuals at the end of the 19th century) and along with it the human cultures dependent on the animals is stunning in its scale and speed. I offered to this acquaintance that had he and I been around 150 years ago we might well have seen such destruction as the natural order, how things ought to be, manifest destiny and all that, as did most Americans back then.
Tiki Tom
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^^^^^
Very true.
Regarding your point about the Buffalo, etc, I think I was well into adulthood before I realized how crazily my own culture had spun the whole thing: somehow painting the pioneers and cowboys and railroads as the “good guys”.
Then you look at the world today and see the same thing all over the place: so many people who can NEVER entertain —for even a moment— that their ”tribe” or “how they were brought up” might be a good candidate for open-minded reexamination. You can point to several places in the world today where average people are incapable of seeing it from the other side‘s point of view. Not even for a minute. Very disappointing.
Human nature, I guess. I try to at least recognize my own biases and prejudices… but it’s hard work. Much easier to just swim with the predominant social currents of the moment. No matter how ridiculous they might seem in 50 years.
Good point about the 1870s through I-don’t-know-when. Manifest Destiny. Ha! Can you imagine trying to sell that today?
Very true.
Regarding your point about the Buffalo, etc, I think I was well into adulthood before I realized how crazily my own culture had spun the whole thing: somehow painting the pioneers and cowboys and railroads as the “good guys”.
Then you look at the world today and see the same thing all over the place: so many people who can NEVER entertain —for even a moment— that their ”tribe” or “how they were brought up” might be a good candidate for open-minded reexamination. You can point to several places in the world today where average people are incapable of seeing it from the other side‘s point of view. Not even for a minute. Very disappointing.
Human nature, I guess. I try to at least recognize my own biases and prejudices… but it’s hard work. Much easier to just swim with the predominant social currents of the moment. No matter how ridiculous they might seem in 50 years.
Good point about the 1870s through I-don’t-know-when. Manifest Destiny. Ha! Can you imagine trying to sell that today?
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That's the funny thing about some old folks.
Some would think that for example pipe smokers are basically cautious people, with the necessary maturity.
Haha!
There are def. some, which you could easily call "morons". Smoking since hundred years, still ruining pipes. These people, which are totally unable to learn.
LizzieMaine
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I think much of this stems from a very basic need -- the need that children have to feel like they can trust the adults in their lives. When you're a child you want to believe that the adults responsible for you know best, and that the things they're telling you are true. And even after you find out that this is not always the case, that the adults surrounding you don't have any all-knowing insight, that they're just muddling thru life as bvvest they can subject to their own faults and misunderstandings,, you still see them as the ultimate authority figures. So their views remain the subconscious default, and you either zealously defend those views, no matter how objectively wrong they might be, or you go to the opposite extreme and assume that 100 percent of everything they told you was the bunk.
What every generation needs, then, is humility. KIds, you're not going to completely remake the world overnight. Old folks, there's a very good chance that what you learned in school half a century or more ago is not entirely correct, and clinging obstinately to it is not going to make it more so.
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Kids sense on a primal level how vulnerable they are and how dependent they are on the adults in their lives for their very survival. And their world is the only world they know. How things are in that world is how the world is.
Too many of us resist outgrowing such perspectives.
Too many of us resist outgrowing such perspectives.
GHT
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Growing up pre-internet, we were always encouraged to, look it up. Most lending libraries had a reference library annex. I haven't seen a reference library for years. Not much need I guess, but although the internet has made research easier, I do take Lizzie's point, it's not all Gospel truth.
LizzieMaine
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It's interesting to page thru my 1937-vintage Britannica and see how much of the, especially, scientific, biological, and natural-history material has been superseded by more accurate understandings, to say nothing of the British Empire vs. Post British Empire interpretations of history. Anyone who believes that knowledge is a static thing is suffering from a profound lack thereof.
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Tiki Tom
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This is a problem. Just because you see it on the internet does not make it true. Yet, if it supports your bias, some people will accept it as fact without questioning the source, etc. It then reinforces your bias… after several rounds of this, a person risks becoming a zealot for whatever his/her cause might be. Like alcohol, use the internet wisely!
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I’d take it a step further and propose that intelligence itself is anything but static, or even measurable in any real sense, for that matter.
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Remember the 90s, when people still thought (influenced by Hollywood), that all Tarantulas are deadly monsters??
Althought, in old Germany, we always had the old saying "Like stung by a Tarantula", NOT "Like killed by a Tarantula".
Sure, Black Widow and others are a different story, but Tarantulas were built up into monsters, for whatever reason.
Althought, in old Germany, we always had the old saying "Like stung by a Tarantula", NOT "Like killed by a Tarantula".
Sure, Black Widow and others are a different story, but Tarantulas were built up into monsters, for whatever reason.
LizzieMaine
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The moment I hear somebody invoke their IQ in any argument is the moment I know there's no reason for me to listen to anything else they might have to say.
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