A Story of Chairs

Think of the chairs in your life. Did your mom or dad have a favorite chair? Did your Grandparents? I think of my first chair, a diminutive red velvet rocking chair that I named “Redda.” My dad picked it up from a roadside stand during one of his trucking trips and gave it to me shortly after my birth. It went through me as well as four younger siblings and by the end of our childhood most of the dark red velvet was rubbed of the seat and arms. The back came loose twice while my dad was alive. The last time he fixed it, he told me that if it happened again, it was going to the dump. It was a thought that nearly broke my heart. I loved that little chair and had spent many hours in it, playing with toys at the old olive green coffee table, reading Dick and Jane books or listening to records on the old record player. I was very careful with it after that warning and frequently cautioned my younger siblings to treat with care as well.

My dad passed suddenly in 1984 and though the back did come loose once again and it sustained rodent damage in a storage locker, by the time I reached adulthood, I still had the little rocking chair. I took it upon myself to restore it, stripping off the old velvet covering in preparation to reupholster it. I discovered that it had been rather cheaply made, with just cardboard for stabilization in places. I also temporarily removed the wooden rockers, one of which hand been gnawed on by a dog called “Pie Pie,” who had passed away ten or so years before.

Life got in the way, with marriage and the birth of the first of my two sons. Still, I kept the two wooden pieces of the frame with me until in the winter of 2001; they were sitting in my yard, still awaiting restoration. It was my son, Carl’s first Christmas. He was six months old when we drove from Burns to Prineville where my mom and two of my sisters lived to spend the holiday. During the present opening, my brother and sister presented me with a rather large box. I opened it to reveal a small red plush chair.

“Oh, it’s just like Redda!” I exclaimed.

“Look closer.” My brother suggested with a grin. I lifted the chair out of the box and it did not take me long to spot the end of the rocker that Pie Pie had chewed on so many years before.

“It is Redda!” I was astonished. Somehow, my delightfully sneaky siblings had absconded with the remains of my beloved chair and brought it back to life. It still sits in my living room now, though even the newer covering has suffered the love of two boys who are now teenagers and far too big to sit in it. Sometimes, one of our fox terriers likes to curl up in it, but I expect that few human children will sit there, as nieces rarely visit. Redda will have to wait until future grandchildren discover its softness and love it just as I once did.

I remember other chairs too. My dad had a favorite that moved with us several times before it was left behind somewhere along the way. It was constructed of metal tubing and had a reddish orange vinyl seat and back. I remember my dad sitting in that chair after work, drinking his coffee out of his favorite old brown cup which often I carried to him, careful to avoid spilling while he listened to Paul Harvey on the radio.

I remember Grandpa and Grandma’s house in Glenview Illinois. Though Grandpa’s favorite place was the left end of an old brown plaid “davenport”, as they called it, Grandma loved her little orange upholstered chair. Each of them had a little wooden side table to go with their favorite place. I still have Grandpa’s little two-tiered table, though it is somewhat worse for wear considering that it survived a house fire and years of storage.

I have always had a favorite place too, starting with little Redda and occasionally a less comfortable straight-backed wooden chair. Currently, my refuge and comfort zone happens to be the burgundy recliner that my mom purchased for herself a few weeks before her death. I helped her by picking it out, unaware that I would end up with it, but in her last days she specifically insisted that I keep her new chair. It is powered, which has taken a bit of getting used to, but it feels like a hug from my mom and I like to think of it as another Redda. I actually write this from the warm embrace of Redda II and think of my mom resting cozily in it. Then, my mind drifts quietly back to all of the other chairs I have known and I realize; there is just something special about a favorite chair.