Good Old Desk

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Just before my senior year of high school, my mother redid my bedroom with a 5-piece set of teak furniture and a 6' x 9' Rya rug.
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The Amazing Technicolor Club Chair and Ottoman

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The Amazing Technicolor Club Chair and Ottoman

I’m not a fashionista,  nor a whiz in the kitchen,  nor good with make-up like some gals  –  I’m a wannabe interior decorator and I love thinking about color schemes,  and window treatments and wallpaper,  and rugs and lamps.  And I actually collect pitchers and bowls.  (See Pitcher and Bowl)

And I like reading decorating magazines,  and refinishing and reupholstering and rearranging the furniture.   Sometimes my husband comes home and says,  “Now where did you move that little table that was right here?”

My parents had a big,  comfortable,  club chair and ottoman covered in a nubby fabric in their living room where my father would sit with the evening paper,   and I remember sitting on his lap in that chair as he taught me how to read the baseball box scores.  (See Box Score)

And so years later furnishing one of our own early apartments,  I decided we needed  a big,  comfortable,  nubby club chair and ottoman too,  and I made the rounds of the major department and furniture stores.   But I couldn’t find a club chair big enough,  or comfortable enough,  or a fabric nubby enough to please me,  and so I went to a little upholstery shop in our neighborhood and had one custom-made.  I happily selected what I thought was a great fabric – a large nubby plaid in beige, blue and red to go with my color scheme.

But that was before I had perfected my decorator’s eye and before I learned that you can’t always tell from a small swatch just how a big piece of furniture will look when it’s upholstered.

So the afternoon my new furniture was to arrive I rushed home from work excitedly to meet the delivery guys.   But when they pulled off the protective brown paper and I saw my chair and ottoman in that awful,  loud plaid fabric I started to cry.

i called my husband’s office.  “You have to come right home,”    I told him,   “we have a crisis here!”

Of course there was nothing much we could do about it,  but as the fabric was nubby – very nubby –  our cat soon got at it,  and eventually we had both the chair and ottoman reupholstered,  this time in red corduroy.

Both pieces were red for many years and then we enlarged our apartment and redecorated,  and got all new living room furniture.  (SeeThe Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe)

But that chair and ottoman had been so well-crafted by that little local upholsterer,   and were still in such good condition that I kept them of course.  I relegated them to our bedroom and reupholstered them – once again – this time in blue to match the color scheme in that room.

But years before when that chair and ottoman were still red,  and my son was still very young,  I went out for the evening – possibly to one of my book clubs.   (See Book Slut, or Why I’m in Six Book Clubs)

When I got home I asked the kid.  “What did you and Daddy do while I was away?”

“We hugged in the red chair and ottoman.”  he said.

So,  strange as it sounds,  that blue chair and ottoman in our bedroom we still call  “the red chair and otter”.  But now you know why.

– Dana Susan Lehrman

Comments On This Prompt

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I STILL cannot post comments on other people’s stories, so….

Comments on “Favorite Teacher” prompt.

Educator of the Year – Remembering Milton by Dana Susan Lehrman

A very evocative tale for me…my grade school had a Milton of its own, although he was the shop teacher, not custodial staff. Mr. Crawley never got full peer-to-peer respect from the “real” teachers (who forget that little kids have big ears). I think that both disdain for his subject and racism played their parts in that. But he was my favorite teacher in grade school. He taught wood shop and life, with an emphasis on kindness and respect for others.

On Principal by Susan Bennet

You very economically painted a vivid picture of Principal Buckley!

All I remember of my school principles was dreading their presence in the school yard. For some reason they dampened down the fun by 30% just by watching it.

Thank you, Esther Perrin! by Sara Gootblatt

I never re-met any grade or high-school teachers, although there was one in 8th grade whose friendliness toward the older boys would, today, be considered at least worth investigating.

Now, as a University staff member, I work with a bunch of Professors. Whether I am first name basis with them is generally an age thing. With one or two, no one would DARE….

Good Morning, Mrs. Shaffer by Edward Guthmann

Grade school teachers have the opportunity to be such a strong influence on their students, for good or bad. By the time a kid is in jigh school, they are, usually, pretty much formed in terms of personality and outlook. The grade school teachers I remember most are second grade, who loaned me all of her first edition Hardy Boy novels to read, and kindergarten, who was nice enough to start quietly passing me by in the “reading circle” because it was getting me bullied after school.

Refuge in Drama by Marian

Teachers can touch our souls in ways big and small. Mr. G sounds like the sort of teacher we can all be thankful we had, if we did!

Frances Henne by Dana Susan Lehrman

Too many academics give short intellectual schrift to professions other than their own. Being a librarian fascinates me the same way being a person who designs tools fascinates me; you get to contribute to MANY fields of endeavor!

Teacher: Here and Now by jonathancanter

Your teacher selection was interesting, but obscured by how much I now crave some salami! And OMG that view…

Señor G by John Shutkin

John, Señor G reminds me of my high school chemistry teacher. Mr. Russo was also young, and less formal with his students than were the older teachers. He was talking about global warming due to fossil fuels back in 1975!

Elaine Zeve by Betsy Pfau

A touching tribute to someone who changed your life, Betsy! We are what, about eight years old in second grade? At that age we are so vulnerable, so malleable. The right (or wrong) person can make such a huge difference. Coincidentally, I had a second grade teacher who helped widen my reading interests by loaning me all her first edition Hardy Boys novels!

You Have Made A Difference by Suzy

I’m running behind (again) on Retrospect reading and commenting…. I hope Miss G. has contacted you. May you become pen pals!

Ave atque Vale by Susan Bennet

You end this wonderous story on a mysterious note! I too hope Miss Stanhope found happiness both personally and professionally.

Latin always reminds me of my first wife. Val was a classicist who was conversant in (ancient) Greek and Latin, as well as French and Spanish. I recall her teaching herself German one summer, just for fun. She was a linguistic polymath. During our (frequent) arguments, she’d call me nasty things in ancient Greek.. The only one I ever managed to translate was “doulos.” I suspect that that was one of the nicer ones!

For Mr. Hollander, Ms. Vit, and Linda by Laurie Levy

My Miss Cartwright was a music teacher. Her way of inspiring young children to love music was to shriek insults at anyone who sang out of tune, and to slam kids whom she thought were misbehaving against the blackboard, hard. I learned to sing so she couldn’t hear me….

Glad you had Mr. Hollander as a counterpoint!

Mademoiselle Moulin by Jan Fox

A short short story in free verse. Love it!

We don’t give a person’s scent the credit it deserves in how we react to them. The bike ride, the mowing…very evocative.

Repeating Fifth Grade by Anne Burdett Srigley

This is an amazing entry in the It’s a Small World annals! I think reconnecting after many years takes a significant measure of courage. Sometimes our recollections are rosier than the reality was. Sometimes people change for, for lack of a better word, the not-better; many of my old friends from before I left for college are now various flavors of MAGA. I have no idea why.

The Drama Queen of Sears Customer Service

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I learned a lot while working at the Sears Customer Service Counter in El Monte, California, in the early sixties while I was attending (what was then called) Cal State LA. Interacting with complaining customers was actually a kind of acting school because we were told always to be positive and sympathetic. True situation: “Oh, your new refrigerator is actually heating your food! I am sooo sorry to hear that. Let me make some notes so the manager can arrange to correct this situation.” And I took down every detail about the fridge, address, phone number and examined the receipt very carefully. Or if we suspected a shoplifter was trying to “return” items for cash, we were to display no suspicion: “We are happy to take care of this, but because you have no receipt, we have to hold these items for 24 hours before the system can issue a refund.” Often the customer would grab up the items and leave in huff. We also had lists behind the counter of items stolen from other Sears stores to check against the goods supposedly being returned. No matter how angry the customer got, we were to remain pleasant. And I really played the part. But if they were abusive or used profanity, we were to go back into the office and get the manager. Brenda was the other college girl who worked some shifts there, and there were two or three mature women also who were so kind and shared tips and tactics for dealing with the irate customers. They told me that it was important to repeat back to the customer what the problem was so they felt heard before offering a solution. That has been valuable in personal relations ever since. We also did gift wrap and that was a fun break from dealing with the stressed out people. And of course, I got a little discount for anything I purchased in the store. What fun it was to purchase a lovely black slip after I got my first paycheck. Another fun bonus was flirting with the young men who worked there loading large items into peoples’ cars. They passed by our counter from time to time and if I wasn’t busy we would exchange a word or two. One time Mick, who was especially fun to banter with, treated me on my break to a burnt almond fudge ice cream cone at the ice cream counter near our department. I wonder whatever happened to Mick? He said he was planning to become a priest, but I doubt very much if he actually did.