History and memories.
An astounding amount of both drove away on Cobb Road last week when Vermont Jon took my ancient Heywood Wakefield couch and chair set. They had been sitting in the barn for much too long. Vermont Jon is a handy sort. He will work his magic on the furniture set and restore them to glory.
I had decidedly mixed feelings as the truck turned the corner. The wooden furniture had been in the family, legend holds, since the mid-1930s. That would be 85 years, more or less. Legend also holds that the set was the center of a bitter family feud between my father and his two sisters. They all wanted it. My father got it.
Big Bob was as Irish as you could get. He quit high school to put his two sisters through teacher’s college. Then they tried to get that furniture. Because of that furniture feud (I assume there were further details), he never spoke to them or even spoke of them, ever again. His exiled sisters were teachers in the Boston Public Schools. We all went through the system and their friends always asked, “How’s Aunt Catherine?” and “How’s your Aunt Margaret?” We would answer “fine,” then go home and ask who the hell they were. We were told sternly, “Don’t ask.” We never met them. Never laid eyes on them. They lived a mile away.
Boston Irish.
Years later, I determined that I delivered the Boston Globe to Catherine’s house on Lagrange Street. I never knew it, of course. I only spoke to her once, to report my father’s death. My mother would not call. When the Irish close the door, the door is closed.
Somehow, I inherited the feud furniture when I moved to North Attleboro and had no furniture at all. I didn’t know the history for years later.
I moved the set from North Attleboro to Gloucester, to Camden, to Tenant’s Harbor, back to Camden on Washington Street, then finally to Cobb Road. Phew. The sturdy furniture survived the multiple moves without a serious dent. This couch and chairs were built for the long haul. Everyone I knew sat in those chairs at one time or another. The wide paddle arms held a drink or two over the decades.
God only knows what history that furniture witnessed in Bob and Julia’s home, before I got it. I would bet it would make an interesting movie.
The couch and chairs were by the front door when we returned from a particularly grueling Allagash River trip. It was the trip that I planned the death of Boston Leo, and then locked the door to the car in Kokadjo when a bear was rampaging behind him. When we finally reached Cobb Manor in the wee, wee hours, Jefferson Phil collapsed on the couch, fully dressed. I had two empty queen size beds upstairs but the climb was too much for them. Leo, grateful to be alive, slept in one of the chairs.
Once during a well-attended Patriots football game at Cobb Manor, I was embarrassed at the poor furniture for the gathering. I bought some couches from a gas station, and then Blue Eyes offered two new, white couches. Suddenly I was rich in furniture. After 45 years of service (to me), the Heywood Wakefield set was banished to the barn.
Now, Vermont Jon is a clever fellow (photographer, fisherman, gourmet cook, wine bore and antique expert) and I expect him to sand and shellac the wood and recover the cushions in grand style. Just wait.
I would not bet against buying them back and finding a place somewhere in Cobb Manor.
History and memories, after all.
Emmet Meara lives in Camden in blissful retirement after working as a reporter for the BDN in Rockland for 30 years.