My Rocking Chair

The week after my mother died, back in August 2000, I marched into Grand Home Furnishings at Valley View and purchased a rocking chair.

For some reason, I wanted - no, I needed - a rocking chair.

I found one that I could purchase straight off the floor and had my husband go up and get it later that afternoon.

I placed the chair and accompanying ottoman where I could watch TV and rock. It was not a place I sat every day, but when I needed a little comforting, I would take a book and spend a bit of time there.

And then two years ago, the sofa broke, and we went through this long saga of getting new furniture. The end result of that was I ended up with a La-Z-Boy recliner/rocker and a living room full of furniture.

So yesterday, my rocking chair went to a new home. Like many of our hand-me-downs, a young firefighter now possesses this. 

A part of me was sorry to see it go, but the room certainly looks less cluttered. Now we have to purchase new end tables and rid ourselves of the old Ashley glass tables.

We are not very changeable, my husband and I. We tend to put the furniture where we want it and leave it there. This living room upheaval has been frustrating (not to mention costly) and I hope that by Thanksgiving we will have the room back in order, with the new end tables and pictures and all back on the wall (we painted in April; the pictures are still in the floor of the spare room).

I think ridding myself of the rocker was an interesting challenge in letting go. It served me for 15 years - and that's a good long time for an impulse purchase of a piece of furniture. It had done its due, and we're moving into a new phase as we age.

Time change. You go from green to tan. But the tan still rocks, so the comfort remains.