Thread Bare (Threadbare) (Rug) Care (Dare) - Part Three

Thread Bare (Threadbare) (Rug) Care (Dare)

Part Three

            It is an old joke; the pool table one (Part One)... about old rugs.  I explain in the John Henry aside how the old rug came to the old New England houses.  For an old rug hunter such as myself and my fellows, the joke that a true ‘good’ (“great”) old rug would have found its way to a house and then... there... be used to ‘cover the pool table’...:  That means to I (eye) that this old rug lives in a very protected state where no one walks on it and no pets pee on it.  “Covering a pool table”.  It is only ‘touched’ when the pool table is used.  So... “super protected” so... “GREAT CONDITION”.  Okay?  And how many old New England homes have old New England pool tables covered with old New England ‘oriental’ ‘rugs’.  Get the joke.  Right?

            But the intended expression is pure... leading to a pure perception of “COULD” there be a that kind of “GREAT” ‘rug’ “IN THERE” and, if so, “WHERE?”.  The answer to ‘could’ is yes and I ...explain in John Henry how the rugs ‘got there’.  “Where?” is by vigilant deductive logic:  Where in the house?  Could they be?  The... GUEST BEDROOM.  For example.  “Oh”.  The room is never used so the rugs are never walked on (peed on).  And:  The things in that room are usually not a “I BOUGHT” decorative selection (say “our sofa”).  They are usually and mostly “THINGS” that are “just HAVE” (given by family to family... over decades and generations).  The guest bedroom is probably the safest place for finding ANY and ALL sorts of old New England decorative art in “great” condition including the ‘really old rugs of natural dyes and bold geometric patterns from the Victorian 1880’s ...and older’.  Now I’ve told you a secret of where to look at Grandmother’s house the next time your there.  And I do find ‘rugs’ there too; good ones... with little threadbare wear and with comparatively little pet ‘usage’.

            So now we know why I am ‘there’ (in the old New England estate), what I am seeking, where I am looking and what am I finding.  And your still, like, “measuring”.  Carrying that a step forward I... explain ...that YOU... do not need to have ANY of these rugs ‘explained’ to you.  I JUST USE MY EYE (art eye).  So I do not have to do a lot or even LOOK at a lot.  It takes ONE SECOND to ‘sense’ if a ‘old threadbare rug’ is a “GOOD ONE” 

            The rugs I am speaking of; am in quest for (hunt for) are ANTIQUES.  I remind.  I am an antiques dealer.  I remind.  I do not seek stylized decorative floor coverings made in the past century (20^th) and now foisted in this century (21^st) with design enhancements inclusive of the particularly galling ‘copies’ of ‘older rugs’.  This last group is epidemic ‘in homes’.  I am actually ‘shown’ them... and have to explain... I-am-an-antiques-dealer-I-seek-antiques.  That doesn’t work.  These ‘new rugs’ are very ‘not threadbare’ and are ‘pee free’.  Too.

            So now I’ve spoken of an actual ‘old (real-good-threadbare-rug) style’ that is a knowing and fast paced threadbare rug ‘super store’ that floats above the traditional Wasp threadbare status valuation.  That is fine.  The old threadbare market is just fine and truly imbedded.  The only thing that is ever more lacking is the... “little rug at the end of the hall that’s the only one he wanted and I’ve always hated that rug because it never lay flat so I sold it to him”... rug.  That is... ‘the good rug’ ‘in there’ (the estate).  Since most homes do not know (distinguish critically) their rugs and, too, have a (rug) blind eye to them TOO... the ‘that one rug there’ extraction of the ‘good rug’ from the estates in the past seventy years is... a done deal.  The only thing that loosens this tight reality is that the market for ever more unbelievably worn rugs has... and continues... to improve... so more true antique old worn rugs ‘in there’ are now of interest.  THAT sort of rug is my number one find.  The pool table rug is long gone but its threadbare friends are ‘still around’.  “Scattered”... like... scatter rugs.

            Meanwhile another iconic thunder cloud needs notice before it disturbs your threadbare intrigue and the ‘old New England home’ ...Wasp ways... residence of these same old rugs.  It is blunt and brutal.

            Old rug dealers... who are not antiques dealers but are (“oriental”) RUG.... DEALERS... have been at this a long time, have a full rolling industry of rugs and old rugs and... much... more.  The last of the much more is to understand and remind yourself that going rug hunting at a ‘one of those’ (rug dealer stores) is NOT the same as going rug hunting in Grandmother’s guest bedroom.  It CAN BE (I’ll get back to this)... but most often ‘is not’.  What I am saying in blunt is that these rug stores are very... very-very skilled at making a rug of any dubious you want appear to be much more of what you are hunting for... with a ‘for a price’.  That last is key.  IF... one goes that way one will

            Pay

            More.

            In my opinion it is pay way more.  True antique threadbare ...threadbare... New England home rugs are found cheap and are ‘too far gone’... so are not worth ‘working on’ to ‘make them better’.  Lesson?  Stay with cheap estate rugs (under five hundred) and leave the ‘slicked up’ ($1600. – 5K) at the store.  Go to a store sometime just to flip tags and get the ‘look and feel’ of the... Operation.  It is not like grandmother’s guest bedroom... there.  Nor are the rugs like the ones IN that guest bedroom.  Unless (the... ‘I’ll get back to this’... from above):

            There is always a chance that Granny actually regularly bought a ‘whole house full’ of these slicked up ‘orientals’ from one or two or three of these ‘rug stores’ and NOW she’s dead and they (these slicked up rugs) are being sold and... you... are there.  No problem.  Whatever you buy... cheap... will be okay because... they are easily salable within the ‘old Wasp threadbare market’.  It doesn’t matter if they are a ‘painted reweave piece of crap’.  That market does

            Not care.

            I sell my ‘these’ to the... flea market rug vender... “no problem”.  My wife never even ever even slightly mentions this sort of rug when I ‘have it’.  No.  She wants

            Real antique rugs.

            Here we go.  It is ‘we’ ‘go’ now... too.  YOU have been ‘spoken with’ about this threadbare thing and now... have been told

            Some

            Stuff

            That should suggest a recalibration of your “there’s one” in your old estate floor covering peeking.  Yes... NOW all the rugs do not ‘look’ the same anymore... because ...you now... know... more.  The recalibration is the... sophistication... of your eye (“I”).

            And taste.

            ?

            Okay.  Here we go now... again.  Taste.  Yes... “THAT”.  Real time real life floor covering taste; the big picture... rescues US from all of this by blatantly showing by actual inspection that ... ‘most people’ do not... DO NOT... have... anything to do in anyway with the threadbare old Wasp ‘oriental’ rug...... rugs... in any way at all... ever.  Go take a look at what real people put on their floors and... obsessively... make me look at.  I WOULD PAY THEIR DOG to pee on “that” (their ‘rugs’).  What all of this I am writing about... is... of... and about... and embraced... and ‘ground stood on’... is of a very... very-very small group of ‘care’:  Wasp threadbare rugs... and... Wasp threadbare rugs ‘good ones’.  It’s a ‘taste’ and NO ONE ELSE HAS IT (that taste).  And... what rug (floor covering) taste the ‘they’ have

            Is scary

            And ‘in bad taste’ (“tacky”).  Try once the voyeur voyeuring by a one of ‘them’ looking at a ...larger natural dyed bold geometric earth tone ‘all wool’ Victorian (1880) “Caucasian” THREAD BARE ‘good one’ that you proudly purloined from a prominent local estate sale...:  Once will be enough... to discover just HOW ALONE in floor covering taste... you are

            These days.

            YOU want REAL RUGS now that you know and ...the whole God damn world thinks you’re a idiot... in addition to having bad taste... when YOU proudly put “THAT?” on your floor.  “THAT” (this sophisticated rug eye floor placing event) makes old Wasp estate threadbare pet pee layering threadbare STYLE appear ‘stable’; “a little eccentric” but, “you know”, ‘stable’.

            So there you are.  The better the rug, the more threadbare it is... because the ‘these good rugs’ are ever more coveted (as antiques) so are protected more and... are more ever more threadbare because that is all there is (is left) of these... real antiques... and you knowing this, discovering this, seeing this...; you quickly TOO become enamored with ‘your these rugs’; the qualities of ‘good’ threadbare rugs ON YOUR FLOOR so...

            Suddenly

            It seems

            That the delicate world of Wasp threadbare rugs has a very serious aura of Wasp threadbare TASTE... that is a known STYLE of Wasp threadbare...

            THAT YOU(?) WANT.

            Even though ‘people think you’re an idiot’.

            These are the rugs I sell; the ‘my rugs’.

            They always sell.

            I never ‘have any’.