Another tale from back in the day!

When I was going to community college I worked at various odd jobs and occasionally did construction for the company my mom worked for. One of these jobs was out on Alki point, in West Seattle. The particular job was fairly mundane a larger duplex condo unit, which when I was there consisted of concrete walls. We were digging plumbing trenches and devising ways to kill the waterproofers from Card's construction (who had screwed up another job I had worked on in the past). I can't remember the name of the young guy I was working with, but he was a musician and was really cool. We sometimes got in trouble for discussing the merits of The Coug (Mellencamp) vs. The Boss (Springsteen). Anyway it made for a fun job, and one day my friend told me a hilarious story which I have never forgotten.

He was from Spokane WA, way out on the Idaho border and he recently had gotten married. Being from Spokane it is highly likely that you will meet, and or be related to several, if not more than several colorful characters. One of these characters was a woman who had married one of his uncles. Apparently she had only two hobbies, and the other thing about her which was not in fact a hobby was the fact that she worked at the Goodwill, and had done so for years. Well the hobbies the woman so enjoyed were chain smoking and making Navajo dreamcatchers. I have heard from more than one person that the two go together hand in glove. Anyway, when she heard about the wedding she was overjoyed. She knew just what to get/make the happy couple. And she went right to work on both her hobbies at the same time! When the couple came home from there honey moon they were perplexed by the strange stale smoke odour coming from the pile of presents. As they opened them up they inspected them to try and find out where exactly the stench was originating from. Finally they got to a small flattish package. Imagine the horror when they opened it up to find not only the source of the smell, but a dream catcher which had "caught" a small Barbie doll bride and groom! My friend told me that it was one of the single most disturbing discoveries of his life! Both he and his wife were totally perplexed trying to figure out what to do. On the one hand the dream catcher was hideous and both agreed that it was not staying in the house. On the other hand, it was hand made by a relative and both felt bad throwing it away. So they decided that it would be best to take it to the Goodwill and "let water find it's own level". Somebody would find it and fall in love with it. Now the discerning reader will note that the "aunt" worked at the Goodwill. The couple did too, so they drove all the way across town to another Goodwill so that the aunt would not see it during the course of her work day, for she would surely recognize it. But what they did not count on was the internal community which makes up the Goodwill employees. Unfortunately the aunt had a friend who worked at the particular Goodwill which the couple had gone to. When she discovered the dream catcher she called up her friend (the one whop made it) and told her to come over right when she got off her shift because she was going to love it! So the aunt did just that. She drove all the way across Spokane only to discover the cold truth. That it was the very same dream catcher she had spent so much time on! I asked my friend what he and his wife did about it, and he laughed. He then told me that his uncle had since gotten divorced, making things better for all concerned during holidays and family parties! So when you take your next stinky dream catcher to the Goodwill, make sure you at least go out of the county! Buzzsaw signing off!