Dumpster Diving on Quality Hill

There are a few things that my husband endures when it comes to my personality and the sometimes questionable antics it tends to produce. Dumpster diving with no shame is one of those questionable antics. Well, tonight he indulged me. Maybe it was because it is birthday week. Maybe it was because spring has finally arrived to the KC metro area. All I know is that his willingness to go along with things tonight scored us a very nice chaise lounge.

Here's how it went down. After a slightly above average meal at Manny's, I suggested we take the long way home with a little tour through Quality Hill. (If you're not familiar with KC, Quality Hill is a downtown neighborhood with great views such as the one above. It is a mix of a few old mansions and newly built row houses.)

We zigzagged our way through the neighborhood, fantasizing about an alternate lifestyle that would involve higher paying jobs and money for private school, but mostly just enjoying the lovely neighborhood. And then it happened. "Whoa! Honey, turn around. There was a great chair in that dumpster back there." It really just sort of spontaneously slipped out. I knew that Ray would not humor me without further cajoling. " Just drive me back there and let me check it out. You can duck or go park the car a block away and pretend you don't know me. But please, can I at least look at it?" "You don't know how hard this is for me", he said as made a u-turn in the next intersection.

Now I don't mean this in the literal sense, but two angels suddenly appeared in the form of hip young ladies who obviously lived in the area. "Oh, you're taking that great chair!" "Yeah! And for the record, my husband in no way approves of what I'm doing here. But reduce, reuse, recycle, right?" "Absolutely! (OK, maybe they didn't say absolutely - but they did OBVIOUSLY approve of what I was doing!) Did you find the cushion for it? I saw a cushion with the same fabric in a dumpster in the upper lot. Just go down here to the corner and take a left then another left." "Thanks!"

Not to be thwarted by the daunting task of getting an overstuffed chaise lounger into a VW Passat, we lifted the cumbersome chaise into the trunk and secured it with jumper cables. At this point my gratitude for Ray's agreement to go along with my whole escapade was making it almost tolerable for him. Plus the affirmation of two young successful looking women eased his embarrassment. And to top it all off, our McGyver-ing the chair into the trunk had just enough tinge of mechanical genius to make him the slightest bit proud.

Our trip up a pretty steep incline on the way to the pot of gold ...er, uh... I mean the upper lot dumpster that supposedly held the cushion to said chaise lounger, convinced us that the chair would indeed make it across the river to our house. But all of that satisfaction was eclipsed by adolescent exuberance when I spotted the cushion. The angels were right! There it was! My little end-zone celebration was a moment of complete glee. And to my surprise, even Ray was grinning, although later he said it was not so much about the chair, but about my obvious delight in the whole thing.

What a lovely story, huh? Well, chapter two wouldn't be so great. The honeymoon was quickly over when we lumbered up the steps to the back door and realized that this chair was a BEAST! But after one hour of flipping and pushing, two doors being removed from their hinges, door jambs being popped off for the first time in 80 years, and a few words on the "Titus don't ever repeat what Mommy just said list" ... we finally got that thing upstairs to the playroom. We each took a turn lounging in the chair and declared it a worthy dive indeed.

* Here's the denoument of the story line. I guess I have just signed up for my first upholstery project. The chair actually could use some new foam on the arms. It is very solid, just needs some padding. When I suggested getting it reupholstered, my sweat-soaked hubby declared "NO! This thing is NEVER leaving this room."