The Ghosts of Couches Past

Have you ever noticed you can trace the course of your life by the sofa in your living room? Think back a moment to the couches of your past. Can you remember where you were, what your life was like, as you sat on the cushions of each of them? When you look at faded Polaroid pictures of your kids in their Halloween costumes sitting on those ghosts of past lives, are you taken back in time?

I began my adult life on a sofa so hot, you could barely stand to lay on it. It was where I sat during my first marriage on two seats so small you could hardly fit another person alongside you. I didn’t pick it out, I would have never chosen it. I married into it. Like the marriage that never quite fit, that sofa was too small for comfort.

After I left that marriage and sofa behind, I came to America with my two girls where I found a new life and a discount couch. It’s what a single mom could afford: blue with flowers, practical and, most of all, cheap. It wasn’t quite the dream, but it was mine -- just like the new life I was building.

Then there came a pretty crème sofa that was the most beautiful one at the Scratch & Dent store. With its barely-noticeable, mismatched cushions and light color, this one fell under the category of “what was I thinking!” I had two children and “crisp and clean” weren’t nearly as important as “sturdy and stain-resistant.” Long since gone, it might be in someone’s basement by now -- who knows.

Years later there was another marriage and another couch; an ugly pink-leather one that came and left with the husband. Divorced again, and sofa less, I talked a friend who needed to store his furniture into letting me have his sofa. Eventually, I bought it from him and when he returned, he bought it back again. It now sits in his mother’s nursing home room -- that’s a lot of life for one small sofa! Even though I loved it, that couch was never really mine.

Finally, there is my current sofa -- the one I now say will be my last. I love it! It’s the one I bought and chose. There were no children to consider, no worries about spilt sippy cups or stray crayon marks. I didn’t have to consult a man or base it on another’s opinion. It’s a couch built and designed to my taste -- as comfortable as a bed, big and roomy enough to share. It’s where I can sit ‘Indian style’ to read a book or cuddle with my grandson. It’s the place I can choose to snuggle with a boyfriend, work in a power nap or just fall asleep alone. It’s not borrowed or inherited, pink nor floral. It’s finally what I want and it fits me perfectly. So this time around it looks like I’ll be keeping my last sofa!