Prompted: Recliner, Free to a Good Home
Your partner writes a Craigslist ad to get rid of an item they totally hate. What does it say?
At first, I considered selling this recliner for a decent price, pocketing the money, and putting it toward something that less of an eye sore. Now, I am willing to consider your best offer. Your best offer can be free. If you rid us of this godforsaken chair, it is yours.
But you should be warned. My partner has an odd affinity with this chair. It is the first purchase he made when he moved to Seattle from Oklahoma. Hauling it up a twisting flight of stairs, he permitted it prominent position on our living room right in front of the television.
For years, he would come home, kick back in his ugly, brown recliner, and find himself lost in other worlds. This chair has been witness to countless movies, books, shows, and video games. It held him while he cried. It held him when he laughed that big laugh of his. It held him while he spun tales as wild as those experienced in all those countless movies, books, shows, and video games. It was loved by a cat who hasn’t been around for years. The damage of her claws left permanent marks on the front of the chair. Staring at the damage, he can only muster, “I sure do miss Ralph (the female cat).”
The chair also holds deep heartbreak and unspeakable wounds in its fabric. Deep within its cushions is the damage of the 2016 World Series, as he watched his beloved Cleveland Indians lose the 2016 World Series to the Chicago Cubs. If asked, he’ll remind you that he has watched this team lose three World Series, two of them in extra innings during Game 7. But 2016 hurt. 2016 still hurts.
Please, rid of this chair. It is time to write a new chapter. It is time for a new chapter and new stories sewn into the fabric of its being. My only hope for you is that the chair brings you as much life, with all its beauty and pain, as it has brought my partner. When life becomes too much or the celebrations too loud, may it bring you comfort and relief. May it shelter you from storms, and may it be the perfect perch to watch the sunrises of new days flood across your life.
Plus, I can’t stand leather, and you would be doing me a solid favor.
Be good to each other,
Nathan
As a member of the factory, you are taking a stand for human powered creation.
