Goodbye Old Friend

It just warms a mother's heart to see her kids so attached to material possessions--in this case, our decade-old yellow sofa. We decided to hang on to this sofa until our third child was past the spit-up stage. So, that milestone having past, this sofa, as big and comfy as it was, had to go. And so it did in our community garage sale this past Saturday. We warned the kids of the impending loss, and they definitely expressed disapproval. However, our need for money and more space in our family room trumped their need for a great place to hold wrestling matches. With one last mournful picture with the much-loved couch, the kids waved goodbye forever and dashed back to playing Legos. We thought that was the end of it, until...

....around 9:30 that night. The kids (we thought) had been asleep for about an hour, and maybe they had! But, our peaceful evening of togetherness in front of a re-run of 24 was interrupted by loud sobs coming from the boys' room. We both jumped up and ran in there, expecting a kid fallen off his bunkbed or a really scary dream. Instead we encountered one really sad little 7-year-old, chanting "sofa, sofa, sofa" in between gut-wrenching sobs. The finality of the end of his life-long fun with the yellow sofa had hit him hard. It broke my heart! In tears myself, I embraced him and explained that the sofa has a very important role to play in a new family now. They would take good care of it. Still sniffling, he nodded in understanding and put his head back on his pillow. I wanted to go back and buy our sofa again! But, with no room to put it in, a wallet in need of the extra $50, and the risk of my sanity being put into question, I decided not to pursue that thought.

So long yellow sofa! Maybe we'll meet again at the next community garage sale!