A Matching Set
When I got my first solo apartment, in the Art Museum area of Philly in 1991, my father bought a bookcase for me and finished it in a cherry stain to match the rest of my furniture. When I moved again in 1994, I told him I needed another bookcase. Not wanting to go through the PITA of finishing another one, he bought the same bookcase, already finished.
Or so he thought. It arrived, and the wrong case was in the box. It was unfinished. As I’m hardly handy, and only sporadically compulsive and perfectionistic, I let it be.
Flash forward fifteen years. My boys have outgrown our beloved stroller of countless miles, the Mountain Buggy Urban Double. I barter with a woodworker, in exchange for finishing the bookcase and two other pieces. Finally, after a decade and a half, I have a truly matching set of bookcases. They’re lovely. And full.
