A few years ago we visited our friends home after they completed a substantial renovation. Among some other changes, what had once been a sun porch was now a cozy little nook that held book cases, a flat screen tv, and two brown leather recliners. How comfortable, how relaxing, and how deceptive!
Later when I decided to make some changes in furniture in our family room, those chocolate brown leather recliners came to mind. Knowing how difficult it is to find something when you actually know what you want, it still didn't take me long to locate two perfect chairs. These were not the overstuffed, homely "frowners" I'd seen so often. These chairs looked comfortable without appearing to be frumpy. Ahhhhh.......a stylish recliner. They were sinfully comfortable, so I plunked down my money and waited impatiently for the delivery date.
And so.....THEY arrived.
The new chairs found their places in our home, all soft, and supple and seductive. With a deep sigh I settled into mine and promptly dozed off. It didn't take long before I came to the realization that recliners are the diabolical invention of someone who is completely against any form of exercise. They are designed to embrace your bottom, conform to your aching back, lift your swelling ankles and lull you into a sense of well being that promotes over eating and laziness to a degree impossible in a straight backed chair. The only human being who burns fewer calories than a person in a recliner is someone in a deep coma. By comparison the common couch potato is an olympic athlete compared to a recliner addict.
How many hours have I passed reading in this recliner? How many insomnia plagued nights have been spent cradled in it's embrace, waiting for morning or at least a good movie to show up on TV? Bouts of cold and flu, recovery from surgery and muscle tearing falls.....all spent right here. My recliner....my friend and my enemy.
I may be a slow learner, but eventually I catch on. I am once again redecorating our family room, and the new furniture selection does not include a recliner......not even one. I have decided to fight the siren song of the recliner and get more out of life. Sometime within the next few months there will be new furniture in this room, and I will rejoin the ranks of the productive. I will write at a desk instead of in the recliner......I will eat at a table instead of in the recliner......I WILL extract myself from this comfortable crippler of the middle aged and keep moving. I am giving up my recliner.
In my attempt to regain my freedom I've discovered you have to be strong, you have to be dedicated, to get out of these doggoned things. Mine lures me to it the moment I walk in the door. Oh sure, it promises to let me out in "just ten minutes"....then it exerts some other worldly kind of gravity to keep me tucked in its embrace. But I'm not in this battle alone, I have help. My husband, ever supportive, has promised if I ever weaken and want to buy recliners again, he will remind me that I should just buy two coffins.....both with chocolate leather interiors of course.
In or out of a recliner....life is good.
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