Intimate Portrait of a Girl and Her Chair

Not too long ago, I had a chair. How it came into my possession was unclear but let’s just say it was a free vintage find. I grew to have an attachment to this inanimate object that represented a time in my life. life when I relied upon it the most. In multiple ways it was a reflection of me. It was used, a wise old soul like myself. It was orange, much like me. But it was soft and supportive and always there. Stationary, non-judgmental and reliable. It lived outside on my patio although it wasn’t upholstered for unforgiving weather conditions but like me, it persevered. It experienced its share of bad weather, also, as I had. In a time of desperation I convinced myself that this chair was my temple. I would go to it to pray, cry and plead with G-d and it provided me with a comfort no one at the time could.  I experienced heartbreak, addiction, mania, depression (and desperation) and late nights with friends who probably drank too much, or at least I did. When I would be away from it for any period of time, even throughout the day I would be anxious to return to the chair to have my cigarette and glass of wine, or three. During one of the hardest breakups I didn’t leave that hair for ten hours over the course of three days. Situating myself with packs of Parliaments, wine and black iced tea, I would curl up on the seat perfectly and rest my head on the arm and somehow felt understood and of course comforted. All from a chair. I wrote some of my most meaningful and profound work so far from this vessel including personal essays,  poems and even the Interlude Series published here. My family affectionately, although confusingly, knew it as “Kailyn’s chair.” My therapist knew that when I referred to myself sitting in the chair that she knew to really pay attention to what I was about to share. Many sessions centered around events experienced in this chair. Pictures taken on film cameras and iPhones found their way into articles, my self-published magazine L’Espace and the Interlude Series as well.

There came a time last year that I was ready to let it go, to say farewell. It no longer provided safety but rather painful reminders of memories and flashbacks of things I wished I never remembered or lived. Many of those were wishing I wasn’t alive to begin with. I started to hate looking at it and almost blamed it for allowing me to indulge in such thoughts and behaviors. I could no longer enjoy my coffee and cigarette in the mornings without an acute physiological reaction to sitting in this piece of furniture that once comforted me and brought me solace and even hope. It was time to give it a new home but weather took its toll and it seemed to have taken all of my damage onto itself and manifested in the cushions and had to be taken to the junkyard. What an injustice, I remember thinking. No one else could comprehend or appreciate all it served and all it did for me. I felt like I was abandoning her, not being grateful for the time spent. Separation anxiety ensued and I even considered reupholstering it and giving  it new meaning, new life but the energy she had already absorbed and the part of me she claimed could never truly go away. It was time. And time for me to accept that the chair represented a specific time in my life. What is it that they say? People are in your life for a reason, a season or a lifetime? I guess the same goes for high backed, Victorian, orange velvet chairs as well.

I was accepted and understood during those few years. Late nights, mania ensued but amazing ideas and creativity were forged into ink and parchment for which I’m grateful. Work I’ll always cherish. When she was hauled away there was a sense of holding on to things I always thought about myself, they were hauled away as well. Unlike old lovers and flames, I think about this chair more often than maybe is appropriate. Obviously, because I wrote this essay. Coming home from the psychiatric ward and eating Jack in the Box while it rained. Reading Patti Smith and Didion. FaceTime calls with friends. But the bad stuff too, the painful parts. Praying to G-d to end it all. Self-harm via shards of glass from broken candles hidden beneath the cushion and my mother screaming, “you have to make a change.” Well a lot has changed and some not at all.  Same experiences but a different house, a different body and a different chair. And a new brand of cigarettes. I wonder if I still had that chair would I still prescribe to the same behaviors? Would I be frozen in another useless obsession and ritual? I do know that I’m experiencing new emotions, harder to process or describe due to a new world I navigate. For this, I mourn that chair, that security.  I feel like I’m habitually always that deer trying to find its footing and I feel this most days in life. There’s no real resolve or solution or a clear conclusion but it is a time of my life defined by an orange, velvet chair. Supporting me in a way I didn’t have appreciation for before. I thank her.