I’ve always been a furniture mover. Not in the
professional, two-guys-and-a-dolly sense. More like the “I woke up today and
this couch looks wrong here” sense. Ever since the passing of Mr.O-P, it’s
become almost a ritual. No one’s around to tell me not to, so I do. I shove, I
lift, I rearrange. It’s my version of spring cleaning, except it happens every
few months, year-round, whether the joints agree or not.
Over the years this has led to a few moments of questionable judgment—like the
time I carried a full-size recliner up a flight of stairs by myself. I still
don’t know how I managed that one. Then there was the incident with the rug
that refused to go upstairs. I eventually rolled it up, duct-taped it to my
body, and crawled up the steps with it attached to me. I wish I were exaggerating.
Last September, I decided the tiny table-for-two in the
conservatory had to go. I wanted something bigger, farmhouse-style, so I could
spread out my coffee, my jewelry-making supplies, my art journals, my
half-finished letters—basically turn the space into my winter headquarters. I
hauled the wicker chairs and that ridiculously heavy mosaic-topped outdoor
table out to the deck to make room feeling very pleased with myself. In came
the farmhouse table.
I hated the new table almost immediately.
Yesterday, in what can only be described as an effort to
completely do myself in, I decided to dismantle the farmhouse table. I removed
the legs and stored them in the entry hall closet. The tabletop—an enormous
slab of wood—had to go to the garage.
If you’ve never tried to move a gigantic wooden tabletop alone,
I don’t recommend it. Lifting it was out of the question. I finally put a quilt
underneath it and pushed the whole contraption across the house like some
deranged sled dog—through the living room, through the laundry room (far
trickier than it sounds), and down two steps, where I smashed one of my toes in
the process. I’m currently waiting for the toenail to turn the color of a
thundercloud. But I did it. The tabletop arrived in the garage and landed
precisely where I wanted it. Huzzah.
This morning, sore in places I didn’t know existed, I decided to
bring the mosaic table and the wicker chairs back inside. It was a glorious,
unseasonable eighty-degree day, so I wiped everything down and began the
process.
The mosaic table, as it turns out, is astonishingly heavy. I’m
beginning to suspect my contractor, Joe, moved it the last time. I tipped it on
its side and rolled it—inch by inch—angling it through the doorway until,
against all odds, it was back in the house.
I felt a ridiculous surge of accomplishment. Like I’d won a
small war against gravity. I simply cannot describe the satisfaction of that
moment.
Then I went back for the last chair. I lifted it, and something
small and gold caught the light underneath.
I froze.
My heart did that thing where it drops and races at the same
time.
My dad’s wedding ring.
The one I’ve worn every day since February 2019, when he left
us. The one that vanished on September 2, 2025.
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That date is burned into me. Haircut in the morning, gas station afterward,
normal day… until I stretched out on the bed that night, Stanley by my side, to
watch an evening of baseball. I just happened to glance at my hand, and the
ring was gone. I was in disbelief! At that moment I felt as if I had been
robbed…somehow…without the physical contact. My brain was on overload trying to
make sense of everything. Number two son, Andrew, was convinced it had to be somewhere in
the house. Statistically speaking, he said, I hadn’t gone many places that day.
So I began searching. I moved furniture, changed bedding, looked under
everything I owned. I called the salon. I called the gas station. I asked them
to keep an eye out, though I had little hope anyone would turn in a vintage
gold wedding band.
I grieved it like another death. It felt like losing my dad all over
again—another piece of him gone, another tether snapped.
And yet here it was. Six months outside. Six months of
blizzards, freezing rain, winter sun, and wind that could peel paint. The ring
looked almost new. Shiny. Untouched. Like it had been waiting.
My hands were shaking when I picked it up.
I sat down on the deck floor and cried. Relief and disbelief and
something softer I can’t quite name. Gratitude, maybe. Or grace. Or just the
sheer absurdity that after all my moving and shoving and rearranging, the thing
I’d lost came back because I moved one last chair.
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I slipped it back on my finger where it belongs. It fits the
same, feels the same, carries the same quiet weight. I’m still wearing my
wedding rings, my mother’s, the one I gave Jim, and now Dad’s again. All of
them together make a little constellation on my hand—a reminder that love
doesn’t have an expiration date, even when the people do.
Those small circles of gold make me feel close to them.
When Dad’s ring disappeared, it felt as if I had lost something
far larger than a piece of jewelry. I fell into a sadness that never quite
lifted.
And there it was.
Under the wicker chair.
The negative voice in my head whispered that maybe I found it
now because my time’s running out, that Andrew should have it next, that the universe
is tying up loose ends. I told that voice to hush. Today I’m choosing the other
story: that sometimes things come back. Sometimes you get a second chance to
hold what mattered most. Sometimes the deck, after all those months of enduring
everything I made it endure, decided to be kind.
I don’t know what tomorrow’s rearrangement will be. Probably
nothing—I can barely walk from yesterday’s heroics. But if I do move something
else, I’ll do it with a little more hope. Because you never know what might be
waiting underneath.
This story is part of my series Life
on Planet Pattie, about the foibles of life, resilience, and the occasional
furniture-moving adventure.
You might also enjoy:
My Dance with the Devil
Nothing
Is Ever Simple (Featuring a Refrigerator and My — GASP! — Underwear)
Refrigerator
Roulette, Round Two
The
Sun’s Sneaky Victory: My “Brilliant” Outdoor Freezer Defrost Debacle
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