Love is in the air, or global warming gave us a blistering cold winter coaxing us to stay indoors and snuggle up, or Hallmark put out some really good cards this February, or whatever you want to blame it on, it's raining babies in my part of the world this fall, and it's got me elbow deep in projects. One of which has been a long standing agreement with two of my sisters over a shared childhood bookcase. No matter who has it last, it goes to the first one of us to have a baby. This little bookcase that could, has been passed around more times than a bong at a Grateful Dead concert, and somehow has come to call my place home for the last couple of years. So in keeping up with my end of the bargain, it will be given back to the expectant sister, but not before it gets a minor face lift. While us girls have come to love it for it's brown-ish goodness, I think in the spirit of giving it not only back to a sister, but to a new owner to make his own memories with it, it should be spiffy and ready to take on its responsibility of being co-creator of new memories.
As you can see in the photo aside from the fact that either the person who put the siding on my apartment, or poured the patio was drunk, we've got some miles on this thing, as well as some spilt candle wax which it still bears the scent of, a Chip and Dale sticker (courtesy of me), and a signature 
of my initials at seven or eight years old ... because every artist has to sign his or her work, though I don't know how much work actually went into sticking Chip and Dale on the back panel of a bookcase, but it's there nevertheless, and ready to be covered. And so it will be, just as the places where I buffed, and sanded little kitty bite-marks from our other sister's fur-bebe who is now holding down the fort in Kitty Heaven, and I'm sure straightening out any shenanigans that may be happening there, or causing a few herself!It's funny how something can be so overlooked, and cherished at the same time. I'd forgotten the wax spills, and the "tagging", and the sticking of stickers, and bite marks, and wobbly back, and paint spatters, and every other perfect imperfection that has a way of making this piece special to us until I started prepping the ol' girl for her procedure. I could remember the day I signed the corner, and my new Disney stickers from Sprouse Reitz that I had to display. I remembered the day my sister wanted to take it for her new apartment, which was bittersweet, it had already been moved to a spare room, but I still loved it. I remembered all the kitties who have used it as a spring board to window sills, and higher furniture, I remembered the posh Barbie condo it had been on more than one sleep over occasion, and all the other abundant mass-uses we've come up with for it over the years. It seems strange that such a small piece could hold so much in it, and I just hope that the next brood to pass it around loves it as much as us girls did.
*After her elective surgery, she'll be spending a few days at an undisclosed retreat, and she'll be back for an exclusive story to talk about the "work" she's had done, and how she feels about her future, and the new man about to be in her life. Stay tuned.*
