On Couches

What An Eminently Comfy Couch: #1

And another Couch of Eminent Comfort: #2

One of the great variety of colorful Ikea-type couches: #3

Perfectly stylish and sleek, but who would snuggle into it of an evening?: #4

During a recent conversation with my friend Eli, I got to thinking about men...and couches.

When I was dating in college, it never crossed my mind to consider whether a particular guy was dependable, whether he'd be a good father, whether I could imagine marrying him.  I was more concerned with (wow, this is embarassing!) whether he was cool - my version of cool was someone who had Deep Thoughts, who was either supremely apathetic (a la Sherlock Holmes) or tortuously impassioned (William Blake comes to mind).  I wanted a guy that I could be with for the moment, and in the moment.  If the guys of my college years were couches, they would have only two things in common: each was totally different from every other, and none of them were comfortable.  Granted, each of them suited me for a while, and all were aesthetically pleasing, but none of them had much to offer beyond that...not that I was looking.  These guys were perfectly good couches...the kind that look smart in the rarely-used living room, but on whom you are afraid to slouch or snack (see couches #3 and #4).

But then, around the time I moved to Arkansas, something in my thinking shifted.  I watched my students - 2nd graders - racing around at recess, or reading at their desks - I saw them learn and grow so quickly - and my frame of perception expanded.  Dating became more of the same, pleasure-seeking for its own sake became (gasp!) boring and predictable, and assessing guys based on their Deep Thoughts or any other silly, deeply unilluminating criterion began to seem (dare I say it?) rather shallow.  

And I began to want something more in a guy than the thrill of discovery.  In couch terms, at this point I thought back on all of the Ikea-type couches of my past - colorful, ephemeral, not too expensive to replace - and imagined instead what I'd now prefer.  My new Platonic ideal of couches would be strong yet soft, timeless in style.  But most importantly, it would be Eminently Comfortable, something that I could sink into gratefully and happily every single day with no qualms about whether it would accept me into its folds.  Something I would smile to look at as I walked through the door after a long day of work.  Something that I would keep - just like Todd's favorite deep green Converse high tops of mine - forever, no matter how it ended up looking, just like the child kept her Velveteen rabbit.  Something that was not so fancy that I had to dress up just to match it, or be too careful.  Something that would suit me - and I it - just as we were (see couches #1 and #2).

So Eli and I were talking and we agreed: 

It is far better in the end to have an Eminently Comfortable Couch, than even a great variety of steely, scratchy, slippery, brilliantly hued couches.  Although Eli has not yet found his Eminently Comfortable Couch, I have found mine in Todd.  It's strange and wonderful how each person seems somehow to find their own Eminently Comfortable Couch and, though all are different, each is perfectly suited to its partner.