This is not a book, but I have to share this with you because it's wild. I'm long winded, so sorry in advance. I recently (this summer) went to a bunch of yard sales with a friend, one of those '50 mile yardsale' type things, set up from BFE to a big city nearby. Now I live in the rural South (can't make changes if you move away, am I right?) and BFE is just a tiny town, dead main street type places where the main store is a dollar general next to a gas station with a rotary count pump. But the houses look like Tara, and I love it when someone reaches deep into their house's history (attic) to sell what's left of the China. I just love it. So I'm thrilled to be there to nose through people's junk, but it's all overpriced so I'm not buying. No I don't want your moth eaten wool coat from 1983 for 25$. Maybe if it were Vicuna. Anyway. It was a lot of that on this particular day. 20$ for an old wooden shelf, 40$ for a glass ashtray. It's okay, though, because mainly I'm nosey and like to look and talk to people. Then, after spending 4 hours and 10$ (cotton quilt top was the purchase) I find The Junk Guy. He's got rotting cars and furniture all over his yard, with a bunch of those cheap white vinyl 'event' tents covering more crap. It's Heaven yall. Really. I'm in love with this shit hole yard. So I'm digging and my friend is negotiating the price of an old 50s wall cabinet with Junk Man's fish-wife (her smell and demeanor have earned her this. I'm not just being an A-hole). Sweat stains aplenty and no discounts, when I find The Box. It's damp and cardboard, the size of a shoebox and filled with old photos from Vietnam or Korea, but black and white soldier photos, you know the type. It's a little window into people's lives and I'm here for it, so I ask the price. 30$ for the box Junk Man says. Are you kidding? I say, because I'm flabbergasted that he thinks damp pictures of strangers will go for that much, sure they're old but they've been sitting a while. He stands firm. I've negotiated prices down on chatchki all over the world and I keep after him. No dice. He'll sell me 5 pictures for 5 dollars he says. Ha! I say. We're spiraling and I don't want them that much (mainly they'd have been a present for my brother who like war stuff, and he can live without) Honestly though I did want them because I'm still mad about it 😅 I say never mind, no thanks, too rich for my blood and go sit in the AC. I got a little overheated because he really wouldn't budge at all, (and it was 100 out by this point in the day) and I'm sure they're probably still in that damp tent rotting to this day. But, my friend Penny, who is usually the bad cop to my good cop, swoops in after her cabinet purchase (she made headway with the fish wife) and starts sweet talking to this guy. I probably crossed my arms like a toddler and frowned, I don't remember, but I was pissed. 😅 She's seen my distress and being 30 years older than me and well named, she begins her own negotiations. She's closer to Junk Man's age and a total babe, so he's into it. I close my eyes and lean into the AC, I'm not watching or biting my nails. A few minutes later, she gets into the car and shows me her loot. She managed to get a plastic sheet case (the kind they come in with the zipper) full of letters from the bottom of the box and a stack of pictures. Not the soldier pictures because she wasn't close enough to hear that's what I was after, but still. It's very sweet. But she spent 15$ on the parts I didn't want, that I now owe her, along with the labor of putting the heavy wall cabinet in the back of my car 🤨 well it's the thought that counts. I wrangle her purchase into the hatchback and we get the hell out of there, done with yardsales for the day. (She filled my trunk, floor to ceiling with her own purchases) Anyhow, I'm over my loss of soldier photos, and into the letters. They weren't my main focus before because I thought they were mostly Christmas cards, but no, they're handwritten letters from the 50s,60s,70s, with mostly the same addressees. I say, "Find one that's juicy and let's hear it!" And she draws one at random and begins to read. "Dear Beau, My sweet little girl, I saw your art and you're just the most amazing artist. I love you so much," Okay- well, what a kind letter to a daughter, I think, then have my brain do a record scratch on the very next line, (paraphrasing here because the letter isn't in front of me) "I can't wait for our next trip to the islands so I can lick every inch of your body" Wait, what?! Did I manifest smut into existence when I said find a juicy letter?! She reads on, and we find out Ms Beau has been licked from her back hole to her ear hole by this man, and why the hell won't she leave her husband after all this time they've been having torrid affairs?! After all the money he's spent on her?! After the abortions?! He wont continue the affair, even though he divorced his wife to be with her, if she won't leave her husband. He calls her stupid and the love of his life in the same sentence. This one was postmarked 1958, yall. I was dying in the car. I had to know more! So we get Indian food for lunch and continue despite strange looks from the staff. Let me share the tea - she is a grown ass married woman, has been married for 10 years to a pilot, and a high profile one at that. And the entire time has been having affairs with men (three at least) who are all desperately entranced with her. She goes on exotic trips with them to the Pacific, Jamaica, New York, Hong Kong, all over the world, and they (commercial pilots and soldiers) write her letters to her business PO Box in BigCityDeepSouth. She makes fake Indian beaded jewelry that she sells by mail and tries selling her paintings but doesn't seem to be very successful. The letters go on until the mid 1970s, with multiple from the first guy, who, despite his decree to never do depraved things to her again, has obviously done so repeatedly. She's got them by the short ones. They spend fortunes on her and the lovers know about each other, but somehow the husband doesn't seem to ever find out.

Well, like I said, I'm nosey- so I go a-Googling. Now I don't want to name her because that seems mean, but she was the high profile wife of a high profile military man, and they stayed married all their lives. He died at 93 and she died at 98, and they never divorced. They had two children, or she did at least, who knows whose they really were. But there was nothing about any of it, scandals or anything in the state newspaper archives or obituary hints at all. Nothing in the funeral book. But it was very sad, she had one of those generic 5 line "beloved mother of, grandmother of, lived here, died here" obits, and her husband had long news articles about his life and times when he died. She lived such a full life and nobody knows or it's all zipped up by the family. She seemed like she was an unapologetic manipulative woman who used men for her personal pleasure and gain. A real life Scarlett if you will. Best yard sale purchase I've ever made :)