Says Vicki, "the 78-year-old woman who has been running the [Ludlow Street Free Store] for almost two decades," quoted in From
"One Woman’s Quest to Rescue the Trash of the Lower East Side 'I accept the fact that I am funding my obsession'" (New York Magazine).
She starts setting up around 9 p.m. on any night it doesn’t rain, schlepping bags of salvaged goods from her small one-bedroom apartment down five flights of stairs and arranging them on the stoop..... A free store doesn’t need her to stick around and monitor what’s taken.... Around 3 a.m., she returns to pack up anything that remains.... ...Vicki spends the same energy and time saving a stack of cans of creamed corn as she does a pile of fur coats.
Like many of her peers who came to the Lower East Side as punks and artists and squatters, Vicki is trying to live by the environmentalist and pacifist ideals she’s held since she was younger.... But she has long found antiwar work disheartening; as she says, “I have been spectacularly unsuccessful at saving the lives of my fellow human beings. But it turns out I’m somewhat better at saving things.”...
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I pity the people who have to do her death cleaning one day.
Man's Search For Meaning... available thru the portal.
Bless her heart for doing this work. Her life has a purpose. She did reveal her leftist tendencies: “In my mind, I was entitled to break the rules — I’m doing all this good work..."
I find it interesting when some media outlet deigns to highlight one of life's Leftist losers. Are they suggesting hers is a path others should follow?
But she has long found antiwar work disheartening
To paraphrase Roger Ebert, the problem with "antiwar work" is that it sure hasn't been any good at stopping wars.
Somethings not adding up….she pays her NYC rent and living expenses (modest though they may be) and $800 a month for storage units with no real income?
Humperdink said...Bless her heart for doing this work. Her life has a purpose. She did reveal her leftist tendencies: “In my mind, I was entitled to break the rules — I’m doing all this good work..."
At least she’s aware that she’s using her ideals to give herself special privileges. Most leftists are unable to make that connection.
Libtards are evil people.
We have worked with an organization that collects and distributes clothing to the homeless and poor. They are flooded with donations of ladies clothing but lack men clothing in the extreme. Their explanation: it appears men are reluctant to give up their old clothing until it's completely worn out.
"Libtards are evil people." Not all of them, Howard; some are just delusional. You of all people should know that.
She sounds sweet and there’s humor in her realistic melancholy about the quest for peace.
"it appears men are reluctant to give up their old clothing until it's completely worn out."
I resemble that remark.
Think globally, (be antiwar) act locally (creamed corn free for the taking).
She's living the dream!
“I have been spectacularly unsuccessful at saving the lives of my fellow human beings." Amazingly mature comment. Most people never notice that.
Oh man I just hoed out all my dead electronics- all the cables and wires ‘go’? Does that mean there’s a market for old floppy drives and DVI? Crap…
…and I’m not surprised the old cast iron isn’t popular but it’s a shame. You can send that stuff off to Smithey in Charleston for restoration. You can buy an old Wagner dutch oven on eBay for a song and for less than a hundred bucks you get restoration and shipping both ways. Or you can pay what? $300 for a Le Cruset that doesn’t heat well and not as versatile…
I think it's common for hoarders to convince themselves that their obsession is somehow helping someone. This particular woman had fanatic communist parents and now manages enough of a cargo-cult imitation of progressive ideals to impress a young writer who doesn't seem to have encountered this form of mental illness before.
I wonder if New Yorkers have a harder time recognizing this as a disorder because they all lead such cramped lives anyway. Her apartment is only 300 square feet (think two rooms, 15x10), and even the hallway to get there looks like a military prison. A lot of readers may be looking at her false floor and thinking it's a great idea.
Reaching a point where your only human contact is a hug from a bum just sounds so lonely, but maybe she doesn't miss it. There will be no one to help her after she breaks a hip falling from a dumpster, though. And in today's New York, all that late-night creeping around makes her an easy target for predators; here's hoping her luck holds out.
I was willing to accept her way of life until she started stacking cans of creamed corn.
thrift shop donations - opinion
Men donate to thrift shops to cycle out old tools and other minor objects they think others will find of utility. They typically don't find fashion of any utlity. The death of their spouse begets the donation of all her clothes and any jewelry of no real value in a burst and some household items a few at a time.
Women donate to thrift shops to upgrade utility and fashion. Purchasing a set of dishes begets a donation of the old incomplete set, a teflon pan an old skillet. Purchasing the dress that finally stuffs the closet too full begets a donation of one or a couple of dresses that are out of fashion. The death of their spouse begets the donation of all his clothes, his tools that relatives don't claim before it's too late and his remembrances she never understood.
A pair of shorts I've worn for the last seventeen years became shop rags due to the button closure on the waistband wearing completely through, rendering it unwearable except by belt. They have been undonatable for at least ten years due to wear and literal tears.
The women's clothing you find will have been typically donated by the owner.
The men's clothing you find will have come from a dead man.
The hardest part about being against war is that people actually love to be fed propaganda and have so few defenses against it. Therapy could help, but all of the therapists are already zombified.
Good Lord, I just watched the short documentary linked in the article. She lives in squalor. Junk piles looming on every side. Clutter covering the floor such that she can't walk around unobstructed. She can barely get water from her kitchen faucet because the sink and counter are so thoroughly covered with garbage as to be unrecognizable. The toilet barely extends out of a pile of stuff, and bathing looks impossible. The walls and floors are decaying.
She's talking on and on about how the "free store" keeps her so busy that she can't deal with her personal circumstances, and it's all just so delusional. I'll bet the storage units started after previous attempts by the city to make her apartment livable. Instead of throwing anything out, she just moved it. Periodically, she probably defaults on a unit and some unlucky Storage Wars contestant bids on her abandoned unit, only to find it crammed to bursting with trash.
She is a hoarder, and mentally ill.
'Rescuing trash'. What a delightful euphemism.
"Their explanation: it appears men are reluctant to give up their old clothing until it's completely worn out."
Once I find something that fits properly, I'll wear it out because I know that I probably won't be able to find another one.
The 'free store' idea -- meaning, putting stuff on the stoop for anyone to take -- is quite common in brownstone NYC (those are the houses that have stoops); less common in apartment-building NYC. For people in Brooklyn, it's how you get rid of unwanted stuff -- usually books, but also kitchen stuff, clothes, electronic gear, outgrown kids' stuff, you name it. We've done it often over the years. What isn't common is this lady's obsessive hoarding and dumpster-diving to stock the 'store.'
When someone in my neighborhood puts out a load of books or LPs/CDs (a pretty common event, as it happens), I usually stop to see what's on offer. The selection in Brooklyn Hts is heavy on academic-press and classical stuff -- a few weeks ago, e.g., it seems a current/former philosophy grad student nearby was unloading a lot of unwanted books by RRorty, RJ Bernstein, AJAyer, ADamasio, among others, along with the entire Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Nice pickings and all in good shape, if that's your thing. Also, quicker and cheaper than a trip to the Strand.
"The 'free store' idea -- meaning, putting stuff on the stoop for anyone to take -- is quite common in brownstone NYC..."
AS opposed to San Francisco, where the "free store" stuff is still on the shelf in the store.
It's a letdown to find out that nobody wants your parents' stuff, or that the furniture you've had for years is just junk. But if you leave it outside somebody might take it, especially if you live in a college town.
Richard Dolan,
The 'free store' idea -- meaning, putting stuff on the stoop for anyone to take -- is quite common in brownstone NYC (those are the houses that have stoops); less common in apartment-building NYC.
Oh, it's "common" nearly everywhere, on a one-off basis. Around here it's generally furniture, damaged or worn out. It'll be curbside, with a sign saying "FREE." Occasionally there are other things, child's toys and the like. But this phenomenon bears no resemblance at all to that. This woman is obviously a hoarder, and way more than a bit out of control.
I am in the process of setting up a Little Free Library -- a place where you put in a bunch of books and let people take what they want, and/or add to what's there. Mine is going to be "curated" (dreadful word) in my own way, with texts from all over my own fields of interest. The range is pretty wide, and for the most part it's already stuff I have (for one reason or another) more than one copy of. There are a few things I want yet, like a decent copy of Lucifer's Hammer (my own is shedding pages).
Mason G @2:43
Nothing but net.
Big O,
And then the great financial tragedy if the widow sells her husband's guitars/guns/tools/fishing tackle for what he said he paid for them!
MDT,
Is that a work you feel would be inappropriate to own the Kindle version of?
$6.99! And none of the pages are loose...
"She is a hoarder, and mentally ill."
She may be a hoarder, but she seems completely rational and self-aware. She is one of many delightful eccentrics one finds in NYC, (or in any community anywhere, really), who, by nature, stand out from those around them due to their quirky personalities and proclivities. She is harming no one and she is helping many. As with Elwood P. Dowd and his pooka "Harvey," bravo to her!
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