First Saturday of Summer in Virginia First Saturday of Summer in Virginia

Day lilies dotting the ditches orange, between tilting mailboxes, amid blue chicory and swales of yellow buttercups. Northwest on Jefferson Highway, alert for bright yellow signs printed YARD SALE, freight train clanging on my right. To follow arrows onto gravel driveways through the woods to arrive at run-down trailers or two-story homes with wraparound porches, wide front lawns and tables of children’s clothing, glassware, games, dolls, obsolete electronics. All around, blue tarps on wet grass with bags of worn quilts and sheets, paired shoes and boots, jeans laid out like Civil War soldiers piled in an open grave. To drive from sale to sale as the sun climbs the sky, blue as Hollywood eyes, coffee in a GO cup. To end at the Art & Craft Show at St. Jude’s, where men with orange flags direct parking across the street from mounds of mulch, gravel, sand, compost. To watch a teen tap dance to the beat of a jangly country song, swirling her flared skirt.

Sep 17, 2013 / Books & the Arts / Joan Mazza