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The Mindfulness Of Thrift Stores

Shop ‘til you exist in the moment

I like to wander the aisles of Texas thrift stores to clear my mind. That is not all I do when I visit the Lone Star State.

I also eat miles of enchiladas with my family when I’m there. But, eventually, I will find myself inside one of the many Goodwills in Austin, where I spend hours staring at junk that could, in the best possible circumstance, be very valuable.

Treasure hunting isn’t why one should embrace second-hand retail, though. There are plenty of practical reasons to shop at a thrift store. An intelligent and eagle-eyed shopper on a budget can find quality clothes, dishes, and suitcases. But everybody there secretly hopes they’ll find a diamond in a shoebox full of a widow’s costume jewelry. There is the legend, too, of the little old lady who found a first edition of “Gone With The Wind” and sold it to a book collector for tens of dollars. Her tale is whispered in every Goodwill across the country.

My mother bought a pair of matching art deco floor lamps last week, twenty bucks for both, but she haggled the price down to fifteen. A deal. She also found a delicate porcelain teacup, a saucer, and a copy of Madeleine L’Engle’s award-winning sci-fi fantasy A Wrinkle In Time…