Blind date

As I pulled up to her home, I wasn’t sure what to expect.  We had only corresponded via email, but she sounded hip.  Her emails were signed “Sue.”  The “From” field had a longer name — “Suzala SF.”

I parked my car and ascended the four flights of stairs.  It was a grand old apartment building in a nice part of SF. I felt excited and sheepish all at the same time.  What the heck was I doing?  And why?

When I reached the top, she was already leaning out her apartment door waiting for me.  Casual dress.  A bright smile.  And spikey silver hair.  She was a good 25 to 30 years older than me.

In her hands?  Exactly what I was looking for.  The soap dish.

It was my newest San Francisco adventure:  freecycle.org.  People have stuff they want.  People have stuff they don’t want.  Someone sends out an email with what they don’t need.   You send out an email with what you want.  If things line up, you get the item.  For free.

Microwaves, bags of random fabric, plastic pots for plants, cables for your TV.  It’s all there. And once you make the pickup, the giver sends out an email with the subject line “TAKEN: …”

But back to Sue.  As I climbed the stairs, I felt ridiculous.  What was I doing here?  Sure, I had been out with friends.  And sure, it was (sort of) on the way home.  But for a soap dish?  Was the economy really that bad?

Deep down, I knew there was something to this soap repository.  And I had to conduct my freecycle experiment.  I rationalized the adventure — “she wouldn’t be giving away just a soap dish if it was lame.”   Besides, I had already gone shopping for a new soap dish.  The local Asian store on Clement only had bright baby-blue plastic things that no self-respecting man would dare put in his bathroom.

I refused to go Crate and Barreling across town just to find what I had in mind.  When I saw Sue’s Freecycle.org posting, it was short and to the point:

unfinished wood dish — rather Japanese in its design
5 x 3.5″ and 1″ tall
Has a removable shelf with little horizontal bars for water to drip thru (doncha hate it when soap has to sit in its wet puddle?) Open bottom.

And sure enough, it was exactly what I was looking for.  The soap dish of my dreams.