Everyday Canvas

Antiques

Prompt: You go to an antique store and find items that belonged to a famous person. What are the items and who did they belong to? Do you buy them? Do you feel a connection to them? Write about this.

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I don’t believe in bad luck. I swear I don’t, but today was weird, far-out, unreal as if I stepped into something I can’t clean up. It happened after this morning, only because I purchased something I thought would be fun from an antique store, out of curiosity and not because I am an antique collector, which I am not. In the first place, I didn’t go to that store on my own. I was dragged there by Joan, my so-called friend.

The fact is, while Joan was pursuing her hobby of collecting knickknacks, I stood by the door and started watching the beautiful sunny day outside, until I had to move to the side when two guys brought in a heavy chestnut trunk, obviously with junk in it. To let them through, I moved in between two tables. On one of the tables, a yellowed newspaper edition under glass caught my attention. In closer scrutiny, I saw that it was THE NEW YORK TIMES of August 29, 1928. It was a notice with a discreet heading of "Miss Earhart on Magazine Staff," which informed the buyer of Amelia Earhart becoming aviation editor for the Cosmopolitan magazine.

“How interesting!” I murmured.

“It is, isn’t it?” I turned around to the person who uttered those words. She was fiftyish, wore a fancy lace collar on a black dress that covered her knees, and despite the pleasant smile, she looked weary. Smoothing back her unruly graying hair, she added, “If you are interested in Emilia Earhart, I can show you her bathing suit and her red suitcase.”

“You have those? Are they real?”

She drew her matronly chest up with indignation. “Yes, of course,” she said with genuine dismay. “We have certificates of authenticity for everything we carry.”

When we left the story, Joan had purchased a tiny demitasse cup, which supposedly belonged to Emperor Hirohito and I was lugging around a red valise with a black bathing suit and the August 29, 1928 copy of the NY Times tucked inside it.

“I see you caught the bug.” Joan glanced mockingly at me and giggled. Before I could answer her, I slipped and fell and bruised my forearm, but that was only the beginning.

So far today, my neighbor’s dog tore into our sliding mesh door and knocked out its rollers, breaking the mesh. Then, my car had a flat tire. Right after I had it fixed, my card company’s fraud division called telling me someone had put three unusual purchases on it. The purchases were from California, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, none of them made by me. The card company canceled the card and said they’d send a new one in the mail within a month.

Then, before I could pull myself together, my fridge died and while I was trying to save what I can save of the perishables, I received three calls from AFL-CIO and several others from the two parties who had the front-runner candidates, each call making me knock something around in my now deranged kitchen.

Right after that, Walgreens called saying that they cannot refill my blood pressure medication I have been using for more than a decade. This was because of the Congressional investigation into Mylan executives. The furious Mylan CEOs ordered the stoppage of manufacturing the generics and a few other medications, and for me to get another medication, I had to see the doctor again. I called the doctor’s office and found out that he was on vacation. I was so flustered, I spilled a whole pot of soup on the kitchen floor.

No wonder Amelia Earhart’s plane disappeared. The woman was a harbinger of ill luck. I think something is fooling around with my life, too, right after I bought her things. I called Joan to ask her if anything went haywire with Hirohito’s demitasse cup. She said she was sipping from it at the moment, and plus, she had some good news. She had won $50,000 from the lotto.

I think I’ll be returning my purchases to the antique shop first thing tomorrow morning---if I can live that long.

Why me!