A pause…

For sixty years…

…four generations of Cochranes…

…have sat around the table…

…on these six chairs.

They’ve traveled among homes in Georgia, South Carolina, Alabama, Kentucky, Texas, Utah, and Ohio. They’ve seated us at many Christmas, Thanksgiving, Easter, birthday, anniversary, retirement, graduation, and wedding meals. They were there for playing cards and other games, coloring, drawing, typing stories, sewing, assembling puzzles, soothing newborns, holding toddlers as they grew heavy with sleep, sneaking goodies from the table to dogs, and smoking and enjoying drinks while telling stories. So many stories. They’ve heard music, laughter, arguments, and borne witness to a million memories shared by the friends and family who sat in them.

It has taken me five years since the flood, when we stopped using them, to remove them from storage and let them go. The consignment shop that took them is part of an organization that in 2023 will mark 100 years of raising money for medical research and development. My mother placed items there when she lived in Houston, and I know she’d be fine with the chairs embarking on another adventure from there.

Debby said it best–she hoped the chairs find a good home with lots of love and laughter. I have dozens of photos showing that’s exactly the kind of family they’ve been with.

Today I’m not myself
And you, you’re someone else
And all these rules don’t fit
And all that starts can quit
What a peculiar state, we’re in
What a peculiar state, we’re in
Let’s play a game
Where all of the lives we lead
Could change
Let’s play a game
Where nothing that we can see
The same
But we’ll find other pieces to the puzzles
Slippin’ out under the locks
I could show you how many moves to checkmate right now
We could take apart this life we’re building
And pack it up inside a box
All that really matters is we’re doing it right now
Right now
But we’ll find other pieces to the puzzles
Slippin’ out under the locks
I could show you how many moves to checkmate right now
We could take apart this life we’re building
And pack it up inside a box
All that really matters is we’re doing it right now
Right now