Man, 20 years of stuff in one Seneca garage...

So we were in Seneca last week. Nice neighborhood, quiet street, big house. The owner called about a "garage cleanout" and I figured, okay, standard job. I pull up, she opens the garage door and... wow.

I'm not exaggerating when I say it looked like 2005 in there. Dust on everything. Like, everything. I think I sneezed like fifty times just moving the first three boxes. My guy looked at me and said "we're gonna need more bags." He was right.

Here's what was in there: old gym gear that definitely hadn't been used since Bush was president. Stacks of magazines — like actual physical magazines, remember those? Enough holiday lights to light up all of Great Falls. An old fridge that weighed more than it had any right to. Three broken chairs. A bag of sand. I have no idea about the sand.

The owner was great, honestly. She kept apologizing and I kept telling her, this is literally our job, don't worry about it. She'd walk in, look around, go "oh my god I forgot about THAT" and walk back out. Classic.

The Part She Didn't Expect

About two hours in, buried under a pile of old towels and random cables, we found this dusty trophy. High school swimming, 1987. Her name on it. I called her over and she got real quiet for a second, then started laughing and almost crying at the same time. She had no idea it was still in there.

That's the thing about garages that haven't been touched in years — they're basically time capsules. You never know what's in the back.

We finished up around 6 PM. Two full truckloads. The fridge went to a certified appliance recycler (there's a fee for those, heads up). The gym gear was in okay shape so it went to a donation center in Fairfax. Everything else... disposal.

By the end she could actually park her car inside for the first time in — her words — "at least 8 years." Said it felt weird. I told her she'd get used to it.