Ode to a Couch

An ad on the “free items” list didn’t work either, and Goodwill didn’t return my phone calls.

I told my wife I was out of ideas: She blamed my sentimental attachment to the couch and suggested I redouble my efforts.

It was a fair critique.

When I left school, I used every dime I could scrounge to make a down payment on a dilapidated bungalow abutting the train tracks in a dubious neighborhood in the town where my new job awaited.

I moved in with nothing but a mattress, TV, and beach chair. My plan was to find a girlfriend who could help me pick out the furniture.

It was a lousy plan: No girlfriend-cum-interior-designer materialized. And why would she have? The lack of decor telegraphed to the (very few) women who saw the place that I was unserious, unable to commit, and no prospect for a relationship—or maybe just a weirdo with no furniture.

A few years later, out for drinks with my rec league basketball team, I managed to chat with a woman and get her phone number. Our point guard brought me down to earth by suggesting that on the off chance she was going to see my house, I might want to make it look like an adult lived there.

Scales fell from my eyes. I went to work and in the following weeks hung curtains, put up artwork, and even painted. And I shopped for furniture, visiting stores and perusing every catalogue I could find, without success.

Meanwhile, a relationship was developing: We went out every weekend and she even made me dinner at her place one night. I needed to reciprocate soon.

I finally asked my best friend and his wife in Chicago to pick something out for me. They went shopping the next afternoon and phoned me from a Room & Board showroom to say they had found something they thought I would like—a white canvas couch with a matching loveseat and ottoman.

They handed the phone to the clerk and I bought it on the spot. Ten days later, it arrived. That evening, I hosted dinner.

When my date saw my furniture she declared herself impressed but had a practical concern: “The white will show every single stain—can you imagine having kids with this furniture?” she asked.

I had not considered that at all, but realized in the moment that I could indeed imagine having kids with this furniture—and with this woman.

So I lied: “I ordered a washable slipcover from the manufacturer. It should be here next week. You can come over and help me put it on.”

The next day I called to see if such a thing existed—it did, and it cost almost as much as the couch itself. I paid extra to have it express shipped. She helped me put it on the next weekend.

Putting on the slipcover became a ritual we would perform together dozens of times after we married and had a family. It proved to be a solid investment: Our two children subjected the couch to the normal stresses of childhood and then some, but nothing that couldn’t come out in the wash.

However, even the best slipcover can’t save a couch from obsolescence. Last month, my wife and our two daughters went shopping and managed to select a replacement in an afternoon.

The writer Joe Sheehan observed that it is a very American idea that we make our own destiny, but serendipity plays a greater role in our lives than we want to admit—perhaps because it is humbling and a little unnerving to think that we are where we are, with the people we are with, in no small part because of random luck.

But it is, it seems to me, an undeniable truth. All we can do is be prepared when a chance encounter presents us with a golden opportunity.

So get the couch before meeting the girl.

Oh, and if you need to get rid of the couch, don’t try to give it away for nothing. I finally disposed of the white canvas couch by advertising it on a different website for way too high a price. The first person who showed up haggled me down while I feigned indignation.