I like to think I'm a pretty laid back guy.  I don't know if it's my nature or a survival technique, honed over decades of necessary compromise.  I suspect the latter, because I'm not a pushover — I like to think I choose my battles.  It's just funny sometimes where the lines are drawn.  The nature of the compromises I'm forced to consider can surprise even me.

Friends of the blog are probably aware I'm moving from the Orphanage in a couple of weeks. I'd been looking for months before finding my new place, but when I saw it I definitely had that "this is it" kind of feeling.  There were things that gave me pause.  I hadn't met the other guy who I'll be moving in with when I had my little feeling.  And I still haven't met his dog.



"Jake" seems like a nice guy.  He's 29, sporty, and about as straight as they come.  And the dog, Oscar, is a golden retriever — and Jake says Oscar's a "nice guy," too.  If anything, all this niceness could get on your nerves if you happen to wake up on the wrong side of the bed.  But there's definitely not a huge drama factor here, which is nice.

The place comes partially furnished, and I like the way the landlady, who's a talented and successful painter, has it set up.  Two long boxy sofas facing each other with a low-slung coffee table between them.  Perfect for having people over, hanging out and lounging. Light a fire, pop a movie in.  It's the perfect plan for those long winter nights, right?  It all seems so... tastefully understated. 

Enter Jake.  Or rather, Jake's recliners.  I don't know why he didn't mention that the sofas he wanted to bring with him were recliner sofas — two of them.  From Bob's Discount Furniture.  I don't know why when he said sofas I just automatically thought Crate & Barrel, but I did.  Bob's — home of the Bob-o-pedic — just didn't even enter the picture.  I was obviously in denial.

We met at the apartment last night to go over some logistics of the move and get oriented (how the buzzer and intercom system works, which keys go to what doors, and so on) and that's when he mentioned that the sofas he'd said he wanted to bring were recliners.  I mean, now that it's a done deal he tells me.

That's more or less them in the picture, but with cup holders.  I mean, there's straight and then there's E-Z Rider with the cup-holder straight.  Immediately my bubble burst.  All the way home in the rain I was thinking: "of course, there had to be a catch."  I'm a simple man.  I don't want much.  Why is God punishing me like this?  I mean, especially like this.

It was all a little awkward when it came out.  I mean, initially I reacted as if it were a joke.  I don't want to sound like a douchebag here, but I don't know anyone with a recliner.  And it's not that I'm anti-recliner, but FIVE OF THEM?  I mean, a reclining sofa AND LOVE SEAT?  REALLY? REALLY REALLY?  It's not just some little kitschy knickknack you can stick on a shelf in the corner and forget about — it's your WHOLE FRIGGIN' LIVING ROOM!

I tried to joke about it.  I was like, "Great!  It'll go with my foosball table!"  But all I could think of was Joey and Chandler and their bachelor pad on Friends.  And unfortunately I get the feeling I'm gonna be stuck being Chandler here, and that's just not how I'd pictured it at all. 

There was a sense of growing dread after he dropped the bomb. 

I was like: "OK, so it's a reclining sofa and love seat?"

His eyes lit up at the thought of it. 

"Yeah!" He said enthusiastically, like it was the coolest thing ever.  "And, like, all of the sections recline, not just the end ones!"

I tried to smile.

"So, do you find you often use all of them at once?"

"Well, you know, if you have friends over..."

I shuttered.  A horrifying picture flashed before my mind's eye — coming home to five grown men (or even four grown men and one of those girls who wants to be one of the guys) looking totally incapacitated in their puffy E-Z Riders, each with a Big Gulp with the game on the TV. 

And then all the sudden I pictured the infusion room of a cancer clinic, where patients get their chemo treatments.  They always have rows of recliners so the patients can stay comfortable for long drip-sessions.  I've spent countless hours in such rooms — when I worked at the Dana Farber and when my father was getting chemo, and later when my mother was.  Recliners will never be the same for me.

I didn't tell Jake any of that, and why should I?  It's not Jake's problem. In fact it seemed like the first he'd considered that not everyone sees the La-Z-Boy as the ultimate in home furnishing. He looked a little vexed by my reaction.  Why would anyone have anything that's not a recliner if you had a choice?

The landlady's willing to leave one of the big sofas, but to be honest, the specter of it alongside one of Jake's E-Z Riders is no more comforting to me than having the E-Z Rider living room set.  There's something slightly more insidious here than just a sofa set.  That someone would think that this was a perfectly natural home furnishing choice is... troubling.  And you don't have to be a Crate & Barrel queen to think so.