A story in the March 6th Boston Globe Magazine caught my attention.  The author 
talks about when he was a young, desperate vacuum cleaner salesman.  The game 
was to find any way to get through the door, and then demonstrate his “Golden 
Jubilee” edition by vacuuming up residual dirt and showing it to the prospective 
customer/mark, who was usually the woman of the house.  It was an old trick to 
vacuum up dirt in a rug that had just been cleaned by her current, obviously 
inferior, machine.  Here are author Howard Mansfield’s own words:

"Then one day a young woman who lived nearby came into the Electrolux showroom.  
She lived behind the shop in a two-room apartment that made you feel lonely just 
looking at it.  She couldn’t afford even a reconditioned economy model.   

I was about to talk her into using a broom when one of the old salesmen took 
over.…..after 15 minutes, the woman left with a new model, the extra power 
nozzle, and a booklet of high-interest payments stretching for years.  She had 
no idea what she’d just spent."

[Here’s where, when I was reading this story, I got aggravated and was ready to 
break the knuckles of the manipulative, ratty, salesman.  The story continued:]

"And, yet, the old salesman was right:  Who was I to tell her what size her 
dream should be?  This was more than a deluxe vacuum; it was a promise to 
herself that one day she’d have the house to go with it.  She was serving notice 
to her husband:  This is how I want to live—like all these people in these big 
houses we see.

The old guy had sold her a dream machine.  That’s what successful salesmen sell, 
and that’s why we keep buying."

I was reminded, reading this, of the time in 2003 when Peter Feinmann sat in the 
old kitchen we hated and said:  “You could be very happy for years to come in 
this big old house with your large family coming and going—all you need to do is 
fix your deck structure, your foundation, replace the kitchen and build a new 
bathroom.  And repair the termite damage and replace the floors. (!)  If you try 
to sell it the way it is, it’s a handyman special and you won’t get much for it, 
but if you fix it up the way its charm deserves you’ll preserve it for another 
100 years and enjoy it with your family.”  Somehow, Peter gave us a vision of 
the possibilities of the place, regardless that it was going to cost us a LOT 
more than a vacuum cleaner on credit.  We bit; for way too close to the purchase 
price of the house in 1987, we renovated the house in 2004, and we’ve been 
loving it ever since, just like Peter prophesied.
  
Putting those two stories together, I thought of a third narrative—something 
much more exciting to me than vacuum cleaners and house renovations.  I’m also a 
salesman—like the old guy with the Electrolux and Peter Feinmann with his house 
visions.  

What I get to do is sell people on their own magnificence and then help them 
bring more of it forth.  The dirt and termites aren’t hard to find, but I don’t 
have to manipulate them into a better vision for themselves—most of them know 
about it already (some more consciously than others), but they most often 
haven’t become completely true believers, yet.  I have faith in them, 
absolutely.  I know what can happen.  Watching the awakening, midwifing the 
delivery of the improved version, tough loving the self-betrayers, helping the 
blind-sided to see.  I suppose it sounds rather grandiose of me to describe it 
that way, but there it is.  And it’s not about me, after all.  

When the raspberry is ready, it comes off the stem of its own accord with just a 
gentle push, falls into fresh soil, and sprouts multiple new canes that spring 
up with vigor.  The genetic material is all in the berry.  This old husbandman 
just nudges it loose and helps pull up a few weeds.  Is that fun?  You can 
imagine……