I found my therapy couch at Goodwill for thirty-eight dollars, sitting between broken office chairs and a desk missing three legs.
Deep purple velvet with tufted cushions and dramatic fringe that screamed Victorian bordello meets community theater. Exactly the kind of ridiculous furniture my ex-husband would have vetoed before I even finished the sentence. Which, of course, was probably why I loved it on sight.
The divorce was finalized three months ago. He got the sensible leather sectional, the investment portfolio, the house with the manicured lawn. I got our daughter every other weekend and a studio apartment that echoed when I walked through it.
My therapist keeps telling me to “create spaces that feel like mine.” So there I was, in the fluorescent light of a thrift store, having feelings about a purple couch.
The woman at the register said it came from an estate sale, once belonging to a woman who ran a vintage costume shop. I pictured her lounging on this same couch, a glass of wine at her elbow, sewing sequins onto old dresses, utterly unbothered by anyone’s opinion of appropriate furniture choices. I liked her immediately, this woman I’d never met.
Getting it home required two TaskRabbit guys and a lot of maneuvering through doorways. My neighbor watched from her apartment, arms folded, and said, “That’s definitely a statement.”
“That’s the point,” I told her.
When the couch was finally in place, the room transformed. My little apartment didn’t echo anymore; it purred.
My daughter comes over tomorrow for the weekend. Last time, she cried because my place “doesn’t feel like home.” Maybe this ridiculous couch won’t fix that. But it’s something that’s mine—chosen without compromise or committee vote.
I ordered throw pillows in jewel tones from a local craftswoman, soft velvet squares the color of garnet, sapphire, and emerald. I told her I was redecorating after a divorce. When the package arrived, I found she’d slipped in an extra pillow embroidered with the words Begin Again.
I cried in my kitchen, holding that pillow, tears dripping into my tea until they turned the chamomile salty.
Tonight, I’m sitting on my absurd purple couch, eating takeout straight from the container, wearing pajamas at six p.m., and watching whatever I want on TV. My ex would have hated everything about this scene.
I’ve never been happier.
Next weekend, I’m picking up a vintage bar cart from a woman who specializes in estate finds. My ex would have called it clutter.
I call it becoming the person I might have been all along—if I hadn’t spent twenty years asking permission.