CARMICHAEL: When the sofa table has a story to tell too

Published 12:01 pm Thursday, February 6, 2020

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was recently given a new (to me) desk with drawers, fresh paint and new hardware; so, I said goodbye to the sofa table that has acted as my home office since 2012.

For some 30 years prior to the beginning of my writing career, the table was used as it was originally intended.

A sofa table is a long, narrow table that is usually placed behind a sofa on which a reading lamp or family photos or just tchotchkes are displayed. 

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It was never meant to be used as a desk, but it served me well as such.

The table was beautiful in its glory days when it sat among other Queen Anne cherry furnishings in the big, beautiful house that was once our family home.

But it had long-since lost its glimmering, well-polished sheen.

The legs were in constant need of a good tightening.

I set the table on the curb last night, hoping someone with a need for such a table and the skill to restore it to its original beauty and sturdiness would come during the night and rescue it.

I was sad to see it was still there this morning. Even the sanitation crew didn’t see fit to pick it up on their rounds, but I know now anything not in the receptacle requires a scheduled pick-up.

As I sat at my shiny new desk this afternoon, a man swerved his car up to the curb and a woman with a cigarette dangling out of the corner of her mouth jumped out of the back seat.

It would be accurate to say she skulked, for she kept looking over her shoulder and surveying the street. She was armed with tools and immediately began taking the legs off the table.

My dogs barked at her from the window and she quickly jumped back into the car.

For a moment, I thought the couple was going to make a hasty retreat, but as soon as I called the dogs away from the window, the car backed up and she finished the job and hurriedly loaded the remaining pieces into the car.

It was broad daylight, yet they seemed almost excited by the fact they might have been caught.

Had anyone knocked on my door, I would gladly have told them to take the table.

I might also have told them the table’s backstory.

I would’ve told them 11 books had been written atop that table.

I might have conjectured that someday, those books might be famous and that table on which they were written might be special to someone besides just me. But I guess that’s just my dreamer’s mind working overtime.

Creative people are like that.

We feel things deeply, even for inanimate objects; and yes, we become teary-eyed when a stranger, intent on portraying a thief, recklessly disassembles a memory.