The Chair

     Bought it at Ikea.  Had it for a few years before I was informed the red cushion didn't go with anything in the house.  Huh?  Went with my back and butt just fine.  Could be I don't have any sense of design or color.  Left on my own my look for the day seeks not being naked.  Any coordination of style or color is pure coincidence.  In cold weather I wear more.  Still wear my socks inside out 'cause they're more comfy that way.  During the first two weeks in November when I'm in the woods I go with; 'don't shoot me 'cause I'm old, tough and stringy but would no doubt make into some seriously fine sausage' blaze orange.  Made it through Vietnam without being seriously wounded and would like to keep it that way.
     Anyhow, the chair found it's way into the cabin where I can use it to my heart's content.  That's the way it is with cabins.  At least the cabins that're actually cabins, not four thousand square foot mini-mansions decorated to the teeth with what's called the cabin look.  i.e. Brand new and made by someone else.  Our's and a whole lot of cabins like it is decorated by homemade and too good to throw out kinda stuff.  Oh yeah, and the too ugly like my chair.
     Take one look at the thin cushion and you know immediately how I fit it.  Guess I've made an impression.  It sits near the pond side wall, angled toward the Franklin stove and alongside the square table I made from leftover construction wood.  Redwood, pine and fir.  On the table sits the radio I keep tuned to MPR, the local public station.  When sitting and reading I drift in and out of the classical music.  Some's great, some good and the rest tolerated.
     In the chair I read.  I hope my choices tell me a good story and tell it well.  Make me stop and think.  That's all I ask.  Usually I have two or three books going at a time.  Both fiction and non.  Hmm, which one should I grab from the stack?
     Should I have company, like the boys from Iowa, and one of them sits in my chair, I never say a word.  Let him sit.  I do think a few words and those border on the unkind.  But should the innocent offender arise and move off, they'll find me perched in my happy spot when they return.
     In this chair I think my thoughts or maybe explore my tri-fold map of the North Country Trail sitting on the stereo speaker over my right shoulder ( one corner's missing.  I used it to pick my teeth).  Didn't walk a foot of it this year though my intentions were good.  As written in the previous entry there's never enough time.  More accurately, never enough alone time.  Guess that's the tradeoff of a full life.  Or at least my version of a full life.  I hike when I can.  Figure that at three days in a good year.
     At thirty to forty days of use a year I figure the chair'll outlive me.  Don't know what'll happen to it after I'm gone and don't much care.  Nothing personal chair.  That's just the way it is.