I usually ignore those ads because I never hang onto anything long enough for it to become worth BIG $$$$! Or even little $.

Getting rid of stuff is a habit I picked up during my stint as a military wife when we moved seven times in 11 years. I learned through experience that the process of packing-moving-unpacking was easier when there was less to pack-move-unpack. Consequently, we lived by the "use it or dump it" philosophy and anything that did not serve an immediate and/or useful purpose was handed off to the movers.

Movers have been the eager recipients of my unwanted furniture, rugs, a stenciled piano, a smoked salmon and a fortune in opened but nearly full bottles of vanilla extract and vodka. During one particular move made especially horrible because of the nonstop mayhem created by a tantrum-throwing three-year-old, I tried to give the child away to one of the movers; however, the little boy's father stepped in and took the child back. But everything else they always kept.

Since I own nothing of value, I flip past those BIG $$$$! ads, but not so long ago one of them caught my eye. It was about woodblock prints purchased in Japan during the late 1960s. That's when we lived in Japan and purchased woodblock prints. Not being knowledgeable about art, we selected our prints by using a simple formula -- the print had to cost less than $30, already framed.

We accumulated 10 prints and still own nine because I gave one to that mover as a sort of consolation prize when my husband wouldn't let him keep our son. It was a small, ugly print of a gold horse, cost less than $10 (framed) and I never did like the thing, anyhow.

The BIG $$$$! ad that jumped out at me named a Japanese artist whose work hangs in our living room. I immediately faxed off a note saving I had a print by the artist, then spent the day off-Island. When I returned home there were five or six messages from the guy who had placed the ad urging me to call him immediately, collect, regardless of the time, day or night because it was "Urgent!"

I was so excited my fingers shook. During the time it took me to misdial twice and listen to three rings, I tried to picture what BIG $$$$! would look like stacked up on my coffee table. Obviously I was going to need a bigger coffee table!

The man explained that he was searching for one specific print, which he described, to complete a collection for a "serious" mega-millionaire collector who was willing to pay "anything" for it.

When I gave him even more details about the print he wanted, I could hear him suck in his breath and gasp, "Oh my God! You have it?"

Unfortunately, no. But I did. Once, but not anymore. I suggested that he might have more success locating the print if he placed his next ad in the Retired Mover's Magazine. Yes indeed, we had kept the child and instead given away the ugly little cheap horse print that would have made me as rich as that woman in Abilene.

So, that's how I missed out on what may be my only big chance to ever see what BIG $$$$! looks like stacked up on my coffee table. There's a moral to this story: If you ever have to decide whether to keep the kid or the piece of art well, you figure it out.

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