On May 1st, Fenway Health announced that all Boomerang’s, the Boston-located thrift stores designed to fund HIV/AIDS care, would be closing after operating for twenty-eight years.
The first time I walked into a Boomerang’s I had just been freshly rejected. Almost at my one-year in Boston mark, I had spent the past three days cleaning out my closet and my shared room, only to find myself standing in front of a much cooler twenty-one-year-old than I was, raising a pierced eyebrow and making straight up weak conversation with me in a bored intonation as she sifted through my hand-picked selects. The most embarrassing collection of words was uttered to me, (“we can give you $4 in cash, or $17 buffalo bucks”) so still full of pride, I took my five garbage bags of self-proclaimed treasures and two accompanying roommates and ran out, seething.
I chose to go to Boomerang’s that day, the one in Central Square, because I had just heard about, and knew it raised funds for AIDS stuff, which is better than whatever Goodwill did anyway. I arrived in an Uber driven by a disgruntled driver, dropped off my bags, and was asked if I wanted a donation receipt, which I said yes to, without even knowing what it was. I looked around and bought a yellow mug, “Nobody knows I’m a natural blonde!”, printed in black thinly-blocked letters. It was my favorite mug for a long time until an ex started using it too much and when we broke up I gave it away.
Thrifting has been a big part of my life for over fifteen years now, since I was a high schooler with an affinity for all things on the Internet, but the holy trifecta was Tumblr, Polyvore, and clothesencounters; which was a YouTube channel ran by Jenn Im and Sarah Chu. My best friend and I would watch their channel, amazed at how similar they were to us, and when we got brave enough, we ventured to our local Goodwill, where I found a Woolrich burgundy cardigan, silly for Miami weather, but regardless a strong ally to my wardrobe. I still have that sweater to this day and have had two friends from two very different lives mend it, once putting back buttons, and another sewing a rip in the sleeve. When I put it on it reminds me of a cold Miami winter when I wore it a lot in high school, over my royal blue uniform polo, but still wearing my Urban Outfitters gladiator sandals that were not dress code. I thrifted a lot in high school, my friends and I would take a grandmother with us on Senior days to use their discount; and with it we bought glittery blazers for Model UN and Deca conferences (lol), sheer, mesh, and lacy black tops to match our Wet N’ Wild black lipstick, discarded Free People and URBN dresses (my fellow avid thrifters can name all UO labels and spot them, hidden amongst the racks in an Instax instant) a collection of vintage bead bags I found with my mom who was grossed out by the whole thing, but later when I showed her and my aunts what I picked up on my excursions, was intrigued and even a little jealous. I kept all these finds until I didn’t fit into them anymore, I once cried at age 23 over a red leather skirt I bought at 16 until my partner at the time scolded me for chastising myself for not fitting into clothes I wore as a teen. Or until I lost them, like the pinky ring with baby pearls and a blue rhinestone I wore all of 2011 or the wicker and tortoise basket I let my aunt borrow for her trip to Italy, stranded somewhere in her closet. I have bonded with countless friends over going thrifting. Nikki and I can spend hours at the Garment District, doing what we call “swimming” in the Pile, which last time was oddly wet. Nothing brings me more joy than rummaging through a pay-by-the-pound sale with friends, yelling over the bins to each other when we find exactly what we know they need. When I travel I look for a thrift store and try to pick up one thing as a souvenir. My latest favorite was in Chattanooga, visiting my dad who was waiting in his truck, as I picked out a pair of Avon earrings shaped like dolphins, which reminded me of our shared previous home.
I’ve been in Boston for nine years, having lived in five apartments in that time, with seven different roommates. As a child, my parents and I moved constantly, so as an adult I struggle to define my “childhood home.” Many of my friends have homes to go back to with hazy pieces of memory to fill the rooms they grew up in. Moving around a lot taught me how to be transient, but as I moved into my first “adult” place, an apartment with an actual living room in East Boston, where we could hear the airplanes throughout the day until it became silent background noise, I was insistent on actually decorating the space, even though the renewal of the lease was at the mercy of our post-grad successes. My roommates gave me the okay to go ahead with my mission, so with a small budget, I set out to my local thrift stores to find vases, coffee books, trays, and old plant pots for our little home. I wanted my space to be mine, something I’ve always been hell-bent on, even when I shared a room with my grandmother growing up; painting a chalkboard on a wall to draw on or painting the room hot pink and telling my parents I actually really liked my final result, although secretly it stressed me out. Like so many girls my rooms were my sanctuaries; the spaces where I talked on the phone with my friends, read and ate popcorn on Friday nights, and stayed up too late on an old junky laptop watching movies in parts on YouTube, were extensions of the person I was molding into. Once given full reign of an entire apartment and having my own money, I felt like the luckiest girl in the world. I wanted everything not to be perfect, but rather, intentional. I didn’t want just a bowl for our keys and coins, I wanted something pretty, something to look at and appreciate, something to be proud of having.
After the Eastie apartment, I moved into a smaller apartment with a couple, whose shared stuff immediately took over the common areas upon moving in, leaving me with only my room to decorate. Two years later, in my last apartment in Somerville, I lived with fellow scourers of the local Boomerang’s and Goodwills, so our apartment was kitsched out, 1960s mugs and plates, plastic frog figurines from a garden-themed quarantine party, and old stained-glass restaurant lampshade hung precariously over our kitchen table, found on the street. That was in my last apartment before I left for Mexico City and Bogotá. I took some trinkets with me on my travels, like the books on my Airbnb’s empty shelves, the postcards and photos hung on the wall using washi tape, the small wooden Virgin Mary statue placed in the entryway. This was my home for the time being, so it had to hold parts of me even if I was away. When I came back to the apartment in Jamaica Plain where I lived now I barely had any furniture, so I went to Boomerang’s on a rainy afternoon and bought a bookshelf for twelve dollars, to store the books I took to Latin America with me, alongside the stuff I deemed worthy enough to keep stored in my friend’s basement. The apartment was cozy but packed with things from my roommate’s own thrifting habit, she was a more merciful thrifter than I, returning home with broken lamps and ceramics she still deemed beautiful; they served as planned projects we never got to, and to me, they only took up space. Still, we both went to Boomerang’s to populate our personal and shared spaces, often bumping into each other after work for her, and pre for me, or many times, an object one of us pondered over at the store and decided against would still end up on the dining table, having been picked up by the other.
Coming back to Boston, especially to be in a neighborhood so unfamiliar to me as JP was, felt like the worst decision I could have made. All my friends lived far away in Somerville, and the divide between us, the sprawling spiral of the Greenway was vast, especially when I had zero money for trains, let alone Ubers. I was disoriented and lonely; laying in the grass at the pond was my only hobby in the area, until I started having an income again. I slept on the mattress on the floor for months, which felt chic until one day it didn’t. It just felt sad. As my bank account grew, I started walking Centre Street, visiting the little shops adorning the street, which felt as though they were only open on the first Wednesday of the month, only if it coincided with the wolf howling at the full moon. I began going to Boomerang’s frequently, since the hours were always consistent, and I could browse for hours and always find something to bring back home, to fill the space I was begrudgingly occupying. The clerks and I became friends, saying hello to each other as I walked in, them starting to learn my taste as I walked up to the register, and me learning more about their lives as our relationships grew. My routine, amidst all of my seemingly eternal angst and sadness — getting a coffee at the City Feed, going to the library to write, and then Boomerang’s as a treat — was an anchor away from the chaos in my brain. JP started to feel like home in the summer when the street trees bloomed with greens and pinks, the orange of the sky against the small buildings created a halo effect on the whole block, the people gathered outside of JP Licks, eating ice cream sitting on the pink udder-shaped tables. Most importantly, my home started to feel like a home too, as I curating my objects to reflect my personhood, I became excited at the idea of making Boston mine again.
Things, I know, are just things at the end of the day. They will inevitably break, get lost, get dull and be given away. They can’t provide us with happiness, no matter how good the find is. I know that as much as I did then when thrifting couldn’t truly fill the hole being carved out by my depression inside of me. Yet, Boomerang’s gave me a library of my own hazy memories and mementos, and the things I gathered there on certain days became almost a part of my life, to pass on to future family or current friends, to enjoy whatever time I have in whatever home I build after this lease ends (I am moving back to Somerville, bittersweetly, at the end of the summer), to encapsulate the way I have chosen to live, to be represented. I crave a home so I’ve learned to make one for myself. A curio with an unknown history helps.
I will miss peering into the auction window and running into the store to put my name into the book, to bid on an 80s Snoopy plushie, an animal mask from Peru, or yet another chair. I’ll miss the music the employees put on, which I often turned off my headphones to listen to, a perfect serendipitous playlist as background noise to my browsing. My friends at the cash register, always down to listen to my ideas for how I’ll style my finds, who gave me thoughtful suggestions. I’ll miss the jewelry case, filled with fun finds, where I found a sterling silver pinky ring I wear in the summer when my finger is more swollen in the heat. The book section that now populates my bookshelves and windowsills. The older, cooler than I’ll ever be, ladies browsing the store with me, sometimes in camaraderie, sometimes snidely looking over each other’s shoulders, to see what is being found and what is being left behind. More than anything, I’ll miss the spirit of Boomerang’s, everyone shopping for that one thing to bring back home, spending our money to benefit members of our community instead of corporations that are slowly taking over the vacant spaces in our city, forever altering what makes Boston actually cool and special, even if in small refuges.
The last time I went to Boomerangs, the clerk asked me if I wanted the receipt, and I said no. “Are you sure?,” she said, “It’ll be a relic soon.” So as a collector that I am, I took it and have plans to display it, in a frame that yes, I got at Boomies.
A list of my favorite things I have bought at Boomerang’s:
A children’s blue bowl decorating with animals dancing I eat cereal from, which I hope to keep for my future child.
Marimekko pillows I manifested after months of browsing the marimekko website.
A wooden sculpture of cattails and leaves, in a vase.
An original painting of what is probably a self portrait in various thick globs of color.
Run River by Joan Didion
An original print that reads, “Art is the sun, moon, and stars, in takeout containers”
Two handmade mugs which have now both broke, one semi-fixed and in use and one beyond repair.
My coffee table, which once I removed the fabric it was upholstered with revealed cool number markings on the wood.
A Kowloon’s scorpion bowl, which I used as a plant pot and gave away as a gift.
A domino ottoman I placed on my porch, until the weather started destroying it, so I moved it inside.
Various Boomerang's finds <3
This week I made this playlist, my first in forever, to commemorate the beginning of my cat-sitting season. There’s some Charli XCX, Kate Bush, Tyler the Creator and Mallcops! Currently I am taking care of Milo, a beautiful Siamese cat with the biggest blue eyes in the world, who likes to sleep on the kitchen chair and smell the breeze on the balcony.
I am reading Swing Time by Zadie Smith, which I couldn’t get into in 2019 but am very much enjoying now (A sign that my frontal lobe developed? I think so.)
I’m back on television! I am currently into K-dramas, I love being lazy and watching Crash Landing On You on the couch all afternoon. Or I’ll watch it sometimes in Spanish with English subtitles on if I have stuff to do around the house, like folding laundry. Captain Ri Jeong Hyeok forever <3
Til the next, with infinite love,
-gabo