A New Relationship
Our bodies are banana shaped now
Many of us emerged from confinement last year ready to shed relationships that no longer work for us. I certainly did. Shortcomings that I didn’t notice while at home just six months of the year became unbearable 24/7.
I’m speaking of my beautiful, but small and noisy, apartment. I responded by selling it and buying another that better suits my new (begrudged) work from-home-more, travel-less lifestyle.
I loved that space. Every time I opened the door, whether after a weekend in Provence or a month in Baghdad or Dhaka, I breathed a sigh of relief. Selling it is an admission that, even if the new apartment is bigger, my world has become smaller.
This was hard to do. But as break-ups go, it was nothing compared to breaking up with my couch.
A standard IKEA model, it was neither especially attractive nor comfortable. I bought it eight years ago out of expediency and retained it out of inertia. Like the best relationships.
Never has a piece of furniture absorbed so much spilled wine, bullshit and tears of despair without a stain. There were days in 2020 in which I did not leave it (ok, maybe a few days in other years too, but never so many days, one right after another). But it, and I, needed to move on.
So, what are the qualities of the ideal new couch? How does one balance comfort and style, like one must with shoes? Will it look good with the giant Dagestani sumac that I finally have the space for?
I think this 1960s Scandinavian green banana couch checks ALL those boxes.
Furthermore, I have been assured by the seller it has no bedbugs and “il est sacré et prêt à être installé pour en profiter.” which means it is holy and ready for me to enjoy myself on. I went to Catholic school so naturally, I Have Drawn Conclusions about this couch and its history. I think it’s perfect.
It turns out my friends have opinions.
Illustrative responses followed.
On moving day, at the last minute I told the movers that, rather than putting the old couch on LeBonCoin, the French get rid-of-shit-you-don’t-want-anymore site, I would keep it, just in case, as a backup. What if I can’t find a new couch I like better? It’s not 2020 anymore, but I might need somewhere certified bedbug-free to cry on in the new apartment, right?
Maybe a buying a holy green banana couch, un-lied upon, from the internet is the right step.
Hi Carpetblogger. Glad to see you are still writing somewhere. I feel the sofa pain. When we lived in Vilnius, the flat came without a sofa, and I could only find red velvet bordello style in the Vilnius of the day. We decided a trip to Helsinki Stockmann’s smart department store would solve the problem. So it did, and we imported two blue denim sofas, which travelled with us to two new apartments in Vilnius, to Athens, and then to 3 houses in Oxford, where only one was needed and finally the last could not get through the door. They were rehoused: one to one daughter in her student flat, and my Brazilian cleaner took the other,
When I moved back to Vilnius to a brand new flat, I wanted a replacement. Since IKEA had not yet come to Vilnius, where else to go but back to Helsinki, for what seemed a 10 years after nostalgia trip. We visited all the same places we remembered, but Stockmanns failed us. But we did find a furniture shop making sofas to measure. Our family (assembling altogether only at Christmas) therefore ordered one very long so two people could fully stretch out watching TV and another shorter sofa for whoever found their seat last.
Unfortunately I never asked about how the long sofa would be assembled when it arrived, and when I did remember to ask, it was already on its way in one very big piece, while I was in Georgia. My Lithuanian chemical engineer lecturer by day, cleaning lady by night to support her wayward children, organised students to bring it up six flights of stairs, and steer it round a very tight corner. It’s served well for 12 years, but if I have to run from the Russians, it’s probably not going to make it with me.