It’s easy to look at the images that Brady Aman shares online — a house, shed and garage stuffed with more than a lifetime of disordered collecting — and see nothing but tragedy.
After all, the front door of the house at 18th Street and Western Avenue couldn’t be opened because so many boxes were packed into the living room behind it. Raccoons had made a home for themselves in the outbuildings. A kitchen that should be filled with appetizing smells instead forced visitors to inhale deeply but only in shock.
Still, Aman can see the sturdy bones of what he has dubbed the hoarder house. When he listens carefully, he can hear the laughter of future occupants, those who will move in after he fills dumpster after dumpster of detritus, after he salvages what still can be used, after he installs new appliances, paints the walls and replaces the floors.
And something good already has come from his early efforts to renovate the house. It happened when he wedged himself into a back bedroom, and his flashlight caught the glint of metal.
“I caught just a glimmer of something shiny in a drawer,” Aman said. “I thought maybe it was a quarter. I went in after it, and it was a pair of dog tags. It said Don Dunnam.”
Aman, who has been documenting his work on the house via Facebook, posted a photograph of the military identification tags. He hoped he could reunite them with their original owner, and within a day he was successful…