> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://dianaludwick.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # Estate - URL: https://dianaludwick.com/estate/ - Published: 2026-04-27T18:47:00.000Z - Updated: 2026-10-24T20:09:11.000Z - Description: “Estate,” a wry observational musing about wading through the lives of the departed elite and a take on 'you can't take it with you.' Written April 27, poem 117 in a series of 365 poems written by Diana Ludwick in 2026. Photo: "Fool's Gold" by Diana Ludwick (c) 2026. - Author: Diana Ludwick - Tags: 2026 Poetry Challenge, Dry Humor, Generational, Humor, Long form musings, Poems, Abandoned Hobbies, Aging, April, Carpet, Classism, Estate, Estate Sales, Evolution, Gargoyle, Grime, Junk, Life and Death, Mobility Device, Noah's Ark, Pharaoh, Pharaohess, Scented Candles, Scooters, Swedish Death Cleaning, The 1%, #Migrated-1792872215677, #wp, #wp-post, #Import 2026-10-24 20:03 "Do you have time?" She'd begun. "Let's do it." She decides for us. We were lured into the woods by blaring yellow signs that simply said **ESTATE SALE**. No address, just an equivocably angled arrow. Like children following a white van that purports to have **CANDY**, we enter a high-cap search for this elusive mansion in the mist. We circle the forests — and almost give up — until we spot several automobiles in an otherwise empty woodland, with their blinkers shining Right. High upon a sylvan hill sits a multi-million dollar estate. Below, more than fifty SUVs and sedans line a shaded cul-de-sac. Above us, one hundred curious visitors about, milling. My gung-ho companion and I trudge up a steep incline past bluestone and gargoyles. We cross paths with people, on their decline, as we rise. "Is it worth the hike up?" We ask one lady. She has a plastic Thank You bag in tow, heavy with untold — and therefore intriguing — loot. She twerks her eyebrow in reply: "Oh, it's memorable!" "But you bought something?" I observe. The departing woman nod-shrugs. Hmm, what are we in for? We wend our way up a double twisting stone stair into a wildly appointed front hall. We sense it immediately. This impromptu excursion is now fated to be *An Experience.* Women in branded smocks guard every exit. One of them points to a stack of shopping hand baskets: "Take one," she off-mands. Stepping over the threshold, we both mutter "Oh wow" in a strange monotone, our expectations side-swiped. Score of dirty shoes tread over soiled wall-to-wall carpets. We squeeze our way through corridors, tight with furniture and wares and looky-loos. Our eyes flit and fly every which way. So many visual inputs, our brains try to keep up with the data noise, the over-stimulation. We are trying to do calculations assessments, appraisals across every known category of collectible. High brow and brow-raising, intermingled and amongst one another, an air of chaotic nonchalance. Painted papyrus scroll triptychs. Off-color 1980s posters. Chippendale furniture. Disney multitudes, some in mint, others in chipped condition. Gold plated bone china. Silicone ice cube trays. Whether designer or derelict, all items feel wildly overpriced. To the point that I ask "Are we on *Candid Camera*?" Not a family who's embraced Swedish Death Cleaning, I take. By the time I'm exiting the library, I already begin mentally deforesting my own house's closets, nooks and horizontal surfaces. Every surface is covered in art. Or crap. Or crappy art in many cases. I yelp when I back into a furry sculpture that nips at my calf. I turn to see my attacker: a sheepskin-flocked, dog-shaped lump of a statue. (To each their own) Each horizontal and vertical space feels filled to its breaking point. Visually, physically, emotionally, these walls and halls bear the accumulated detritus of a least two lifetimes of long-lived humans, and their now-grown children. It's a weekend Estate Sale in privileged horse and woods country, the kind of elite thrifting diversion this area is known for. A chance to walk the halls of the monied class. Poke into gourmet kitchens. Glance into five-car garages. Peek into koi ponds and gander at putting greens. Saunter through pool houses. Assess if it's possible to carry a two-hundred pound stone bowl down the winding drive. (It's not.) Score discount haute couture found arranged tight like sardines bursting from walk-around closets larger than my own bedroom. The official mission: purchase heirlooms at a bargain. A secondary benefit, of course: see how the one percent live(d). For this manse, I wager, had owners, past tense. Omnipresent, warring scents of Yankee Candle-esque Ocean Moments, Summer Shine and Apple Orchard scented wax jars flicker in near every corner. It leads me to wonder in *what* rooms, not if, any elders had expired. A walk to the un-attached carriage house confirms my hypothesis. In a Noah's Ark of aging and decline, we spy two of each lined up, ready to board: Canes, tripods, walkers, scooters. As if being readied for the next world, voyage makers for the departed Pharaoh and Pharaohess. At the front, the last life stage, are a couple wheelchairs, side-by-side in life and now, too, in post. Taken as a whole: An evolutionary line-up, in reverse. My buying buddy's attention shifts in approval, pointing out the pair of Ferrari red mobility devices. "You know, those are top-of-the-line scooters. These folks knew how to *fly*." I chide her to buy one, "You know, for later. Fifty bucks is a steal!" She demurs. "Too soon, for me." We make our way back into the main house where the top floors are crammed with hanging rods on wheels and muumuus and furs and dinglehoppers and golf polos. One room is dedicated to the aspiration to craft: sewing, crochet, quilting supplies if nary proof of projects in flight. Every room we enter brings with it a lesson in oboselence and futility: Colorful iMacs, discarded Barbies strewn in boxes. Leaking laundry bottles in brands I've never heard of. Yellowed soft cover fad cookbooks. So many sagging, threadbare satin settees. Piles and stacks of momentos, sports paraphernalia, kitchen gadgets tried-once-and-gave-up hobby wares. Walls of carefully curated collectors' items that likely have no resale value. All that glitters, is likely grime. I open a kitchen island drawer to see if any nifty tools are for sale. Instead, I find a half inch of crumbs and a loose, Phillips head screw. I instinctively shudder. Close the drawer too fast; a dust plume fills my nose. I grimace*. Yech*. This home is filled-to-the-rafters with decaying gimmicks and junk. The sadness creeps into our souls, like the light coat of mildew found on so many of the dodgy items with high-dollar neon sale tags. I imagine the adult children, walking the halls one last time sighing and signing the Estate Sale vendor's contract. *Sell it all. We don't want to keep a thing.* Our glee for voyeurism fades like the velvet couch in the parlor. Between the smells and the parallels of too much and of nothingness, our spirits are flagging. It's getting bleak — in the house and in my head. My shopping pal and I exchange eyes. The Glance. You know the one. The: *Let's Jet! And don't trip* *because I won't slow down* *to pick you back up*! look. We cut a quick path to an exit. We descend down the steep hill towards the sedan. Each of us, lost in our thoughts, likely about the inevitability of death and what legacies we might leave. Light stuff. Lighter than the junk we see others making their way down to their vehicles with. It doesn't matter how many zeroes are in your estate. You will die, like all beings. And all your troves of belongings? You can't take it with you. What matters so deeply in life is but a husk when you're gone.