Copyright © 2018
by Ralph F. Couey
It's always a shock when that wily beast known as "times have changed" jumps right up in your grill. The effect is instant disorientation, and finally, that sense of loss.
In preparation for our move to Hawai'i, we decided not to keep our household goods in storage. It seemed easy enough to say, "we'll just sell it all." As is often the case, easy to say is very hard to do. What we had was that same mix of large and small that every homeowner acquires over decades. I finally parted with a lot of those things I had hauled around in boxes for the last two or three decades. Some got sold, some donated, some just thrown away, albeit reluctantly and painfully. But those decisions have been much easier to make this time around as our backs are figuratively against the wall. I wasn't worried about the furniture. It is excellent quality, the marker of our decision to pay more to get more. As the days have passed however, it would appear that the time of "big furniture" has passed us by.
The two pieces that lay at the centerpiece of our lives are both Ethan Allen, a china hutch and a roll top desk. We acquired them around 1982 when the Pearl Harbor Navy Exchange had an Ethan Allen sale. We bought them on layaway, and managed to pay them off. Along with those two items, we also bought a long dining room table with two benches and two Captain's Chairs, the better to feed our growing family. The table and benches were sold in Missouri. The chairs we have still. But the hutch and desk have remained with us, through multiple moves, decorating six different dwellings over those thirty-six years. The idea of parting with them was painful, but painfully necessary.
But like a spoiled twenty-something, those two pieces have refused to move on. As I talked to those who came to our garage sale, I began to realize how times had changed. When we were young(er), it was considered culturally necessary to have those big hulking pieces of furniture in your home. To have them was a sign that you knew value and taste, and were willing to extend yourself to have them. It was also, I think, a sense of permanence, that we had arrived and we were here to stay.
But times and tastes have changed. You can't sell big honkin' furniture to the Ikea generation. They're not in to that kind of thing anymore. One young man who visited the sale (yes, visited), complimented me on the Ethan Allen furniture. I asked if he was interested, and he replied, "Nah, I'm the Ikea Generation. If I can't put it together, it's not real furniture."
I was already beginning to suspect this was the case, given the reaction of those who looked and walked away, and the desultory response to multiple social media postings. It's axiomatic of any marketplace that in order to sell something, somebody has to want to have it. And that's where I am at this point. Nobody wants this furniture, thus I can't sell them.
The final default choice was to donate them, but even that has proven difficult. Most of the organizations who sell donated goods have limits on the size of the items they will accept. And it appears that these items exceed that size. That really leaves us in a quandary. Being furniture, we can't just haul it down to the sidewalk and hang a "free" sign on it. For one thing, after a bone dry summer, it has been very stormy here in metro Denver of late. And not just rain, but high winds, lightning, and hail as well. For the other...well...it just seems to be a tacky thing to do.
So the items have been reposted with the addendum "make offer." And I have a sneaking suspicion that the only cost benefit we will accrue will be the labor of someone willing to haul the stuff away.
In a normal situation, I would be sorrowful to lose that furniture. But this is not a normal situation. We have to leave Colorado in ten days, and those things, along with everything else that's left, have to go. There's no choice left.
Since we've been married, Cheryl and I have moved by count 21 times in 40 years, and for most of those moves, the hutch and desk have gone with us. But that time has passed, and it is time to start again from the ground up as far as furniture goes. It's a little like parenting in that when the time is reached when you have to say goodbye, you also have to let go.
I just hope I can find someone to adopt my furniture.
Soon.
No comments:
Post a Comment