Sally Breslin: My Life

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Monday, July 21, 2025

I'M STILL TOO EMBARRASSED TO DONATE ITEMS TO CHARITY

I’ve been trying to do some spring cleaning this week – which actually is more like pre-autumn cleaning, I’m so far behind – and I’ve come to realize I’m confused about what should be donated and what should be tossed out.

The truth is, the last time I donated anything was about 15 years ago, when we moved from our previous house to our current one. That’s because I haven’t parted with much of anything since then – mainly because I still haven’t unpacked a lot of it.

But looking back, even in those days the whole donation process was pretty complicated.

For example, after spending hours rounding up, boxing and hauling my collection of Writer’s Market books – issues 1984 to 2006, with each one about the thickness of a Manhattan phone book – along with approximately 400 romance novels, to the Salvation Army Thrift Store, I was told they weren’t accepting any books.

Goodwill, however, loved books…at least back then they did, before I brought them a truckload of mine. For all I know, thanks to me, they probably ended up having to search for additional funding so they could build a library.

Clothing donations were another thing I had to become educated about back then. I’d always thought that old clothes in any condition – buttons missing, tears, lint, broken zippers, spaghetti stains, etc. – were welcome because they could be repaired and de-stained to look as good as new.

Not so.

Both Goodwill and the Salvation Army wanted clothes that were either new or close to new in appearance. One employee explained to me, “If the clothes are something you wouldn’t want to be caught dead wearing in public, then chances are our shoppers won’t want to be caught alive wearing them.”

She had a point. That probably meant no shoppers would be whipping out their credit cards to buy my paint-splattered sweatpants with the hole in the seat. I also wondered about style. Would my double-breasted, pink paisley jacket from 1969, although still in excellent condition, be something “vintage” that shoppers would want to buy and wear…or just point at and laugh?

“Maybe someone might buy it…for a Halloween party,” I said to myself as I tossed the jacket into the “donate” bag. The same went for my bright yellow ruffled blouse and neon-orange stretch-pants with the stirrups for the feet. I figured someone, like maybe a crossing guard, might want to buy them and wear them…to avoid being run over by an oncoming truck.

Furniture also was tricky to donate. For some reason, most charities at that time treated sofa beds as if someone with the plague had slept on them. So if you showed up with a sofa bed, you went home with the sofa bed.

I’d assumed, however, that, unlike clothing, the actual condition of furniture wasn’t too important. I mean, I knew plenty of people who enjoyed buying old furniture and repairing it, stripping it down and then painting, staining or reupholstering it.

But just as I was about to bring my end tables with the assortment of dog-claw scratches and toothmarks on them to one of the charities, my neighbor told me he’d just tried to donate a peeling curio-cabinet and they’d rejected it. Upset because he’d wasted a good part of the morning lugging it over there, he’d snapped at them, “Well, what do you expect? If it still looked brand new, I wouldn’t be getting rid of it!”

To be honest, another reason why I stopped donating items years ago was because something terribly embarrassing happened – so embarrassing, the mere memory still causes my cheeks to turn red.

After we moved into our new house, I went back to our old homestead to clean out the big storage shed in the yard. I filled about three trash bags with stuff to be taken to the dump – old mildewed magazines and newspapers, expired canned goods, containers of dried-up latex paint, rags, rusty tools and much more.

But I also found some still-nice things in their original packages out there – like just about every new handyman-type gadget advertised on TV that my husband just HAD to have…and then never used.

Okay, so maybe the unused ThighMaster was mine.

Anyway, I put those items into a separate trash bag so I could donate them.

An hour later, I finally glanced at my watch and realized I was running late for an appointment, so I grabbed the bag of donation items and left. On the way to my appointment, I dropped off the bag at Goodwill.

The next day, when I returned to the old house to continue cleaning out the shed, I noticed there was some room left in one of the trash bags, so I still could add a few more things to it. When I opened it, however, I was bewildered to see it contained the good items, including the ThighMaster I thought I’d taken to Goodwill.

That’s when I realized I must have accidentally grabbed one of the bags of trash and donated that instead! Even worse, I knew the bag contained catalogs that had my name and address printed on them, so I wouldn't even be able to remain anonymous. With every passing minute I became more and more apprehensive about the police arriving to arrest me for illegal dumping.

When I later confessed to my husband what had happened and told him how embarrassed I felt, sympathetic soul that he was, he burst out laughing.

“Well, you know what they always say,” he said. “One man’s trash is another man’s treasure! Who knows? Maybe someone can fold a few of those old newspapers into an origami mini-dress or something. And all of the holes the mice chewed in them might end up looking like lace.”

At that moment, I seriously wondered if one of the charities might accept HIM as a donation…if I put new clothes on him first.

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Monday, July 14, 2025

MY PROPANE TANK WAS HELD HOSTAGE

It probably sounds weird that I recently was sitting here in 90-degree heat and humidity and thinking about winter fuel. But economically, I’ve been feeling compelled to get the best bargain. And if that means thinking about my furnace in the middle of a July heatwave, then so be it. I mean, it’s no worse than those Christmas in July sales going on everywhere right now, right?

The thing is, a few days ago I received a very tempting offer from a competing propane company…like a dollar less per gallon than my current supplier is charging me. And when you have a 500-gallon tank to fill every winter, that’s a pretty significant chunk of money.

So I called my current propane company and told them I was going to switch to another supplier because they were charging $1 less per gallon. I thought the switch would be fairly simple. I'd just close my current account and then sign up with the new company.

However, I had no idea blackmail would be involved.

“Well,” the customer-service representative said, “If you switch, that means we’ll have to come over to take back OUR tank, seeing we own it. Your new supplier will have to install one of their own for you.”

My hopes took an immediate nosedive. So I told her I’d think about it and then get back to her.

Too clearly I remembered the tank’s original installation when the house was under construction...and there was no way I wanted to go through it again.

Back then, when the tank arrived, the shape and size of it reminded me of the Hindenburg. Even worse, the gas company determined that the ideal location for the most direct access for the gas line would be directly in front of the house.

"It's so ugly!" I said to my husband. "How on earth are we going to camouflage that thing?"

"We could always paint it to look like something else," he said. "It kind of reminds me of a giant pickle."

Somehow, the thought of having a giant pickle sitting on my front lawn didn't really appeal to me – not unless I wanted to open a hamburger stand.

When I complained to the gas-company guy, he said, “Well, we can always bury it, if you prefer.”

He didn't have to suggest it twice. In fact, I was so eager to be rid of the eyesore, I was ready to grab a shovel and dig the hole myself.

The actual hole, as it turned out, was big enough to bury a Greyhound bus. But when the tank's burial was over and done with, all that could be seen above the ground was what looked like a small manhole cover with a hole in the center of it. As I stared at it, I imagined a circle of lovely flowers concealing it…or a big hedge. Either way, I was pleased with the results.

Three weeks after that, we finally had the heating system installed in the house. I called the gas company and told them I was ready to have the propane tank filled and get everything hooked up.

A truck delivered propane a few days later, followed by a workman who arrived to connect whatever fuel lines needed to be connected.

He was at the house for less than a half-hour when he came over to me and said, "I have bad news."

Bad news was something I'd heard a lot of since trying to build that wretched house, so I braced myself for what was to come. I was pretty certain of one thing, however – that whatever it was, it was going to cost money.

"The propane tank leaks," he said. "This is really rare with new tanks. They're all supposed to be rigorously tested before they leave the factory."

Obviously someone had been less than rigorous. Leave it to me, I thought, to get the misfit.

He led me over to the tank, lifted the little manhole cover and then squirted something that looked like dishwashing liquid down into the hole. The tank instantly turned into a bubble-making machine.

"That's not good," he pointed out, just in case I might have thought a tank spewing soap bubbles was a good thing – like a party event or something.

"So how do we stop it?" I asked him, thinking he'd probably just slap a patch on the leak.

"We'll have to send a truck over to extract all of the propane first," he said. "Then we'll dig up this tank and replace it with another new one. It will be an all-day job. I'll have to get back to you and let you know when we can schedule it."

With that, he was gone, leaving me with the bubbly tank.

"Am I wrong to feel nervous about this?" I asked my husband later that night. "Isn't a gas leak an emergency? I mean, on TV I've seen them evacuate entire city blocks for less!"

"That's natural gas, not propane," he said.

"So gas is gas, isn't it? You wouldn't toss a match at either one, would you?"

“I’m sure they shut off the tank to all of the possible connections,” he said. “Nobody is living in the house yet so no gas is being used anyway.”

Still, when I drove up to the new house the next day, I was nervous just being within 20 feet of the tank. I became even more nervous when I spotted one of the construction workers smoking a cigar to ward off mosquitoes as he installed the railings on the front porch.

I had visions of him unconsciously tossing the lit cigar butt in the direction of the tank and having it fall into the hole, where it would send the tank shooting out of the ground like a missile, straight into orbit.

Also, the gas tank was located so close to the chemical toilet I'd rented for the workers, I was worried that gas fumes might seep into it, mix with the toilet chemicals and create some dangerous toxic reaction. The thought of keeling over in a porta-potty with my jeans down around my ankles prevented me from setting foot in there all day, no matter how much my bladder threatened to burst.

It took over a week for the gas company to return. A new tank was installed and buried, and it’s been fine ever since.

So the thought of digging it up again really didn’t appeal to me, even if it did mean saving $1 per gallon.

Discouraged, I called the propane company that was offering the lower rate and told them I wouldn’t be switching over to them after all, because my current company was holding the gas tank hostage.

“What if we make them an offer they can’t refuse?” the employee said to me.

“It doesn’t involve a horse’s head does it?” I asked, recalling the Godfather movies.

“No,” the woman said, laughing. “We’ll offer to give them a brand new tank if they will leave yours where it is and allow us to use it.”

Suddenly I felt like royalty. I mean, was my business really so valuable to them, they were willing to sacrifice an expensive new tank for it?

I dared to feel optimistic once again. “Sure, give it a try.”

Within an hour, I received a call from my propane company.

“We have decided,” the employee said, “not only to match the price per gallon of the other supplier, but also to deduct an extra five cents per gallon…if you remain with us.”

I couldn’t believe my ears. Two companies suddenly were so determined to get my business, they were involved in a price war? Things like that just never happened to me. At that moment I went from feeling like Queen Sally to feeling like the Queen Mother.

So I ended up keeping my current company, keeping the tank, and getting $1.05 off on every gallon of propane – effective until the end of next April – complete with a written contract to seal the deal.

I think I might be on a lucky streak.

And just in case I am, I'm going to call DirecTV and tell them I’m switching over to Dish TV.

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Monday, July 7, 2025

I MISS THE OLD-FASHIONED SOAP OPERAS

I grew up watching soap operas (now called daytime dramas), mainly because my mother was hooked on one called Search for Tomorrow. Back in the 1950s, Mom, wearing her crisp cotton housedress and apron, would drop whatever she was doing and rush to sit in front of the TV the minute her favorite soap opera popped on.

In those days, Search for Tomorrow’s heroine, Joanne, who also wore crisp cotton housedresses (and her hair in a bun), was a kind-hearted woman who listened to everyone's problem over coffee and did a lot of crying into lace-edged hankies as the ever-present organ music played in the background.

And what made poor Joanne so upset? It usually was her wayward daughter, Patti, who did such unforgivable things as flunk a math test at school or stay out 20 minutes past her curfew.

“That Patti is such a brat!” my mother, shaking her head in disgust, would say after each show. “If I were Joanne, I would ship her off to a boarding school!”

I’m pretty sure there were other reasons for Joanne’s daily flood of tears. For one thing, she and her husband were forced to sleep in twin beds (thanks to the strict television censorship back then), which probably would be enough to depress anyone.

I really enjoyed watching soap operas back in the 1950s and ‘60s because the characters had fairly normal lives and normal everyday problems to which just about everyone could relate. I mean, an entire episode back then might feature such pulse-pounding subjects as not having enough money to buy a birthday gift, or accidentally making two dates for the same night.

But over the years, the soaps evolved so much, they soon bore no resemblance whatsoever to any life that could be considered even remotely normal.

If Search for Tomorrow were to premiere today, Joanne would have a name like “Skylark” and be a former stripper with numerous ex-husbands, two current lovers (one of whom is half her age and used to date her daughter), and six children, each fathered by a different mystery man - at least one of whom is an alien from another planet or a thug who is heavily involved in organized crime.

Joanne’s wayward daughter Patti probably would be a neurosurgeon with one of the current popular "anna"-suffixed names (e.g. Brianna, Arianna, Adrianna, Gianna, etc.), who has multiple personalities and a child who hates her so much, she runs off to live with a cult leader she met online and ends up in a remote cabin in some town with a made-up soap-opera name like “Evergreenville.”

Soap operas, after all, are famous for naming towns after trees and adding “ville” to the ends of them.

Years ago, if you missed an episode or two of a soap opera, it was no big deal. That’s because back then, a day in the life of a soap-opera character lasted about 95 days in real life. If you tuned in to an episode in July and then didn’t watch the show again until Christmas, you still could pick up the plot pretty much where you’d left off.

Nowadays, however, soap-opera storylines move so swiftly, if a character has a baby (adopts a baby, steals a baby, finds an abandoned baby) on Monday, it’s a safe bet the baby will be shaving by Friday.

I realize that modern soap operas are supposed to reflect the changing times, but I can’t help but wonder how many of us actually live in a town where every available bachelor looks like a male model and is either a doctor, lawyer, police officer, firefighter or a detective?

Frankly, over the years, the more I watched soap operas, the more annoyed I became with certain things about them. For example, the characters’ lack of morning breath. I don’t know anyone who can wake up out of a dead sleep in the morning and roll over and talk nose to nose with his sweetie without making her eyes water. And miraculously, the sweetie always awakened in full makeup, complete with false eyelashes, and her hair looking as if she just stepped out of a beauty salon. The woman must have slept sitting up. If I ever wore false eyelashes to bed, no doubt they would fall off during the night and stick to me somewhere else, like under my nose, and I’d wake up looking like Hitler.

Another thing that always annoyed me was the characters’ unknown children who always seemed to pop up during the program’s ratings slumps. These children ranged in age from less than one year to over 30, depending on what the main characters needed at the time. Whenever a long-lost child was going to be added to the plot, a typical conversation would go something like this:

“Why, Dr. Hunkyman, I’ve been working for you for three years now, and I had no idea you had a 25-year-old son!”

“Neither did I, Julianna, until his mother, a woman I met way back when I was suffering from amnesia after a train wreck in Mapleville, texted me last week and told me about him. I can’t wait for you to meet him. After all, you’re both about the same age and I know how lonely you’ve been since your husband died tragically in that volcano eruption in Tobongo during your honeymoon. Perhaps this is fate.”

Alas, when my favorite soap opera, All my Children, was canceled after I’d faithfully been watching it for about 112 years, I was so crushed, I vowed never to watch another soap again, and switched over to reality talk-shows like Jerry Springer and Maury Povich.

A normal day on Maury’s show often featured a young woman who'd asked four or five guys to take paternity tests so she could determine which one had fathered her baby. And one of those "lucky" fellows inevitably would end up having Maury point at him and shout his famous daily line..."You ARE the father!" to the cheers and applause of the audience members.

But then there was the woman who was up to man number nine and still hadn't found a DNA match for her child.

Maybe soap operas weren't all that far-fetched after all.

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