How to Survive Life in the Suburbs

Would You Buy A Dead Man’s Clothes?

in Everyday on

I’ve said it before and I will say it again.  Stick around the Suburbs long enough and you will see a little bit of every kind of crazy.  This however, was a new one for me.

A couple of months ago, the lady down the street lost her husband.  This is an older couple, but none the less, death is always sad. 

garage_saleLast weekend, little old lady had a garage sale.  As we drove by I took a super nosy  peek at what she was selling.  A beaten up desk, some mirrors, a TV and racks and racks of little old man clothes.  It took a moment for my brain to register what it was seeing. 

Little old lady was selling her dead husbands clothes and people were buying them!  Shiver.

Now it’s not like I generally go “Garage Sale-ing” and on the odd occasion that I have, I sure haven’t picked up any man clothes, but for some reason this really freaked me out!  Aren’t there some things that should be off limits for “re-sale”?  I’m thinking things like, oh I don’t know, used doggy chew toys, puzzles with half the pieces missing, and dead man clothes should not be sitting in a persons driveway with for sale stickers on them.  New Suburban law, don’t sell your dead partners clothes in a garage sale.  It’s icky.  Thoughts?

Linky Love:

Hapari $85 SwimSuit Giveaway

Canadian Only Sensodyne Giveaway

    • Comments

    1. I can’t bring myself to ever shop at garage sales, period. Buying clothes that other people have worn bothers me… no matter if they’re dead or alive!

    5. I guess I am too emotionally attached! I can’t imagine haggaling over the price on my Hubby’s old golf shirts, jackets and sweaters. They would be going to charity or I would be a big ole crying mess. Just me!

    6. As someone who has never had a garage sale, and has shopped at one only a few more times than I’ve held one…I don’t think that the clothes are wrong. The ones he died wearing should pretty much be off limits, but, the rest are fair game.

    7. I can’t understand why that should be something “icky”? It’s just clothes! And people die. It’s not like anyone has rotted in those clothes, last time he wore them he was alive like us. Why bother more with buying his used clothes than mine? For my part I wouldn’t mind buying the clothes he had on him when he died either (if he didn’t bleed/vomit/pee all over them). No worse than buying the chair he sat on.

    9. I just finished a book where the wife gave away her dead husbands clothes and was comforted by seeing them on people throughout town all day.
      As for me…I wouldn’t buy an old man’s clothes…dead or not. (Just not my style!)

    10. Plenty of people don’t mind wearing used clothing (I’m not one of them). What they don’t know won’t hurt them and it’s better to give the stuff another chance to be useful than to throw it out.

      I’m imagining a clear-eyed, practical widow, grieving but getting on with things.

    11. I’ll be odd man out here. I don’t view cloths as all that personal of an item. It’s not as if he died while wearing them. Just my hummable opinion. If I died and my husband needed money, by all means he should sell my things if he wants too.I’m done with them

    13. I know I wouldn’t personally buy dead man’s clothes. However, I agree with Heather. I would donate them not sell them. But who knows maybe the lady needs the money?

      CBG
      canadianbloggergirl.blogspot.com