LONG BEACH — I have been trying to get my friend Cynthia to the Long Beach flea market for a very long time. It is my favorite, by far, of all the Southland flea markets, held on the third Sunday of the month at Veterans Stadium. Cynthia, a prodigious collector, always had (lame) excuses.
Finally I decided that the only way was to make a weekend of it. We would spend Saturday morning at garage and yard sales in Long Beach, then check into a nearby hotel, have a great meal and, come Sunday morning, be at the Long Beach swap as early as possible.
Although I go to the Long Beach flea market about six times a year, it never feels like I'm in Long Beach. You can't see the Queen Mary or downtown at all. The market is tucked away near the airport, off the San Diego Freeway. Since I don't live near there, I went on the Internet and looked at the local paper's classifieds the day before we left. I just typed in keywords "garage" and "yard" and "estate" and got 14 listings. I eliminated a few obvious duds, which left six that sounded promising. Then I plotted them on the Thomas Bros. Map book.
Going from one garage sale to the next turned out to be a de facto tour of the city. Our first stop, about 8:30 a.m., was at a small warehouse, run by an estate liquidator, in a dreary commercial district. The Oriental rugs were nice looking but not for us. The small items were all in locked cabinets and had professionally appraised price tags. Depression glass vases for $200. Somebody here was using a price guide. No fair.
The reason to go to garage sales is that people don't know what they've got. Save the price guides for the flea markets.
The second sale was inside a home. Most of the items were pretty old and weary. But I found an ecru crocheted tablecloth for $15 that, out of its macabre context, will look great thrown over my floral sofa.
Our third stop was what I call a nothing-better-to- do-so-let's-clean-out-the-closet garage sale. Nothing was old enough for us (my cutoff is 1955; Cynthia's is 1975).
Things picked up when we hit a better neighborhood, El Dorado Park Estates near El Dorado Park, where a professional garage sale organizer was putting on a house sale. There were dozens of cars parked out front and a line to pay the cashier. We found typical garage sale items like old board games, but also some nice silver and well-worn old things. I snatched up a silver creamer without a top, which would make a great flower vase, for $5. Cynthia said she would have bought it if I'd put it down.
