Look What $5 Will Buy

Kenmore 158-1211

Here's the last purchase I made on Craigslist. No power cord, no photo, but a sad story of giving up on her desire to sew. Good intentions started out with this sewing machine but after a move and a lost power cord, that was the last straw. I took a chance, hoping I had a Kenmore power cord that would match, so I picked it up after work, about a 15 minute drive, and she came home with me.

As I sat in slow traffic and she was next to me in the passengers seat, I couldn't resist grabbing a screwdriver and taking the top off. One plastic gear but very clean so I was encouraged. Once home I had about 20 minutes to eat dinner and get to yoga class but I managed to run downstairs with her and find a power cord. Yup, there was one from a sewing machine that was iffy (could I get it working better?) so it was tried and run for a few minutes. It sounded okay, a little slow from the long wait to be used. After yoga, where I had a difficult time emptying my mind of other thoughts (she kept calling to me "Karen, Karen...), I came home to check her out better. While the inside of the machine might have been clean, the other openings revealed she was pretty dirty with packed-in lint and threads. Here's where my handy vacuum cleaner attachment comes in to suck out all the link and thread bits. Now I had to take the bottom covers off to see how much else there was and I'm glad I did because it really needed a suction treatment!

Kenmore 158-1211 bobbin area cleaned up

  It appears she needed more oil and gentle treatment to get the rattley noises out. When there is that much lint present, it can actually insulate noise and help a sewing machine sound better. Not work better, just sound better! Now that it's all clean you can hear those parts touching each other and adjustments need to be made. All cleaned up, running great, I emailed the last owner back and told her that she did have a nice sewing machine, thanks for her kindness in passing it along, and I will see that it gets a new home with someone who can't afford even a $50 sewing machine. She wrote back and said she was glad it was going to someone who could use it.

Not an exciting story, no great secrets revealed, but isn't this just like most of our lives? We are just moving forward (like there is a choice?), helping along the way, getting a few moments to smile, rejoice, get frustrated, keep going, and somehow manage to feel good about what we do.