The sofa does not fit into the large, yet sleek SUV.
We’ve carried it out of my apartment, my dad and I. It’s not the easiest thing for someone like me with chronic pain to do but I am able to because there is goal. I just have to get it downstairs and into my dad’s car.
But the sofa does not fit, though it should, though it is supposed to fit.
In the moment, it does not feel like a metaphor but an impossible problem.
I don’t have the strength to carry it back up my apartment and my dad cannot carry a sofa by himself no matter how strong he is and so we are stuck with this sofa in the back of my building, the large spacious trunk of the SUV, its seats folded down, empty, because the sofa does not fit.
Any way you slice it, moving sucks. Everyone says so because everyone has done it and everyone knows the veracity of such a statement.
But if you can manage to keep your spirits up, with a little creativity, the kindness of strangers, and the willingness to ask for help, you can find the moments of gratitude in the midst of the chaos and frustration that is moving, in the midst of moments where the sofa does not fit. And that isn’t just an optimist talking, that’s me telling you, a girl who absolutely hates moving.
We carry the sofa (I am struggling) into the building’s offices, as they graciously allow us to store it for 20 minutes while we drive that sleek but useless SUV to Home Depot to rent a van. The sofa was supposed to fit in the SUV so we could drop it off at Nonna’s garage where it would live for two months during a transition time with roommates (it gets complicated) and then of course, my dad and I would go see Creed, the movie I have been dying to see (especially with my dad because I don’t think I would even know who Rocky is if not for him).
But the sofa did not fit.
I call my future roommate, asking if she is home. I ask her if it is okay if the sofa comes earlier to the apartment. She tells me: yes, and by the way, why don’t you pack the van with a bunch of stuff and bring that too? You might as well. It will save you a trip later.
I might as well.
“There’s a road I’d like to tell you about, lives in my home town
Lake Shore Drive the road is called and it’ll take you up or down
From rags on up to riches fifteen minutes you can fly
Pretty blue lights along the way, help you right on by
And the blue lights shining with a heavenly grace, help you right on by”
It begins to pour. My dad, my new roommate, and I unload the van. The sofa is dropped in the very dirty, rainy, muddy street. This is devastating in that I bought that sofa with my hard earned money 16 months ago but also not devastating because when you move, things happen and you are just happy the sofa fits through the door (once you unscrew the legs, of course, and even then just barely).
The night ends at Starbucks where dad and I each order a drink. He’s on his way home even as I write this (In fact, as I proofread this, I receive a phone call from him about the horrendous traffic back to the ‘burbs. What can I say except today was the day where the sofa did not fit? Instead, since he has not read this, I mostly say nothing except I am sorry over and over again). I am sitting on my bed, in what will soon be my old apartment, which looks as if a tornado went through it because I was not prepared to move the bigger pieces.
But guess what?
They are moved. I am one step closer to being moved out and moved in at the new place.
And before the Starbucks, I played Lake Shore Drive, that song my dad told me about, while we sat in rainy traffic together, back in the SUV, van returned, the red lights in front of us blurred by the drops clinging to our windshield. I replayed it and then played it again. And again.
It’s a good song. Sometimes that is enough. Sometimes that is more than enough.
We never did see that movie (I will see it eventually!).
But if the sofa would have fit, I wouldn’t have spent the day with my dad actually talking; I would still have an extra truckload of stuff to move; we never would have driven down Lake Shore Drive which brought the song to Dad’s mind and so I would not know the song.
“And there ain’t no road just like it
Anywhere I found…”
You’ve got to find those moments, those perfect moments filled with a cast of imperfect characters, when you’re sitting next to your dad as an adult, listening to a song he first heard in high school. When you find those moments, sit there as long as you can. It’s grace, pure and simple.
You’ve got boxes to pack, an apartment that looks like a scene straight out of the movie twister. Your back is so sore and you don’t know what the heck you will blog about tomorrow. The traffic…well, let’s not discuss the traffic.
“Pretty blue lights along the way, help you right on by
And the blue lights shining with a heavenly grace, help you right on by”
So when you find those moments, even if the sofa doesn’t fit, even if there is traffic, if the piano in the song is catchy enough, if the melody is just right, it’s a memory you’ll tuck away forever. It could pass in the time it takes to youtube the song if you aren’t careful. Blink and you’ll miss it. So be careful. Pay attention. Forget the sofa that fell in the dirty, wet street. You’re sitting next to your Dad–a man you admire, a man you’ve butted heads with–and you are both singing the words to a song written decades ago.
He is remembering it and you are discovering it. And there is no reason that a day like today should give you such a moment. But it does. So take it with both hands. There are so few rare, perfect moments in this world.
“And there ain’t no road just like it
Anywhere I found…”
So, thank you, Sofa. For starting it all by not fitting.
(Linking up with Emily for A Grateful Heart. After all, she was the one, who as I complained about moving, just told me to get off my butt and get started which I definitely needed).
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