30 Dec January at Experienced Goods
By Jennie Reichman
The inspiration for this month’s article begins with a spatula. Not one I bought for a dollar at Experienced Goods, but a green silicone number I purchased sometime in the mid-1980s while visiting my friend Ruth in Seattle. She had taken me to Sur La Table, an extraordinary kitchen store that is a veritable paradise for cooks and bakers. As we wandered the aisles of utensils and cookware, she plucked said spatula from a display and declared, “You need to buy this. It’s the best spatula you will ever use.” Silicone was a new thing in cooking then, sleek and functional and slightly suspect, not your mother’s rubber utensils. It was also probably kind of pricey for a spatula in 1987, but I bought it because Ruth usually knows what she’s talking about when it comes to cooking and baking. Darned if I haven’t used that spatula for over 30 years, its simplicity and ergonomic perfection folding in egg whites, stirring sauces and swiping bowls clean almost daily. Fast forward to last month’s Christmas Day as I was folding Nutella into a whipped cream topping for a cake: I made a circuit of the bowl and emerged with half a spatula, the other half sticking up jauntily in the middle of the frosting. It was like witnessing the demise of an old and faithful friend, one that had seen me through moves and marriages and career changes, always there when I reached for it, doing the job better than other, lesser utensils. I couldn’t bring myself to immediately throw it in the trash, took a picture of it and texted it to Ruth, “End of an era!,” I said. “RIP, green spatula!,” she texted back.
The thing is, that spatula represented a lot of things: My deep, long-term friendship with Ruth that has only gotten deeper over the years; a time when I was making a life for myself on my own for the first time, buying things I would use in that life; how much fun Ruth and I had exploring and imagining our futures; how things (and sometimes people) remain consistent and relevant over stretches of time without being flashy or noticeable, just there and reliable, until they leave us and we are left holding half a spatula and feeling bereft.
It’s possible that many of the hundreds of objects that are donated to Experienced Goods have similar histories, especially the old-fashioned ones that don’t plug in (looking at you, hand-cranked egg beaters). Did someone appreciate and use that tool over decades? Did it make their life easier? Did they pass it down to someone who didn’t understand it or had no use for it and who put it in a box of donations coming to the shop? The beauty of finding such an object at a thrift store is that the person buying it is often excited by it and imagines using it. I am fascinated by the alternative uses people come up with for utensils, furniture or small appliances, for instance, using an electric popcorn popper to roast green coffee beans or wine racks to store hand towels. Or buying something that supports a simpler, less technology-driven life, like a well-seasoned wok or a whetstone for sharpening knives. In addition to raising money for Brattleboro Area Hospice, this is the function of Experienced Goods: to reinvigorate objects and clothing with new purpose, to make them relevant again and allow their stories to continue.
As for my green spatula, I don’t know if I will ever find one as good or that I love as much, not in small part because of the memories attached to the old one. But I will keep my eyes open and am ready for the next perfect spatula to come into my life, maybe from Experienced Goods, maybe accompanied by its own set of tales and adventures.