Plastic Sofa Covers

When I was nine I enjoyed the privileged life of being a titan of industry.  

This came vicariously during the annual slumber party my brother and I enjoyed at my Aunt Sydelle and Uncle Ruben’s.  They lived in a fabulous apartment high above the Outer Drive in Chicago’s Gold Coast neighborhood. Far below in the marble-floored lobby, Jake, the broad-shouldered doorman would issue a zippy “welcome back, Mr. Eisenberg!” every time I’d return with my uncle from whatever Windy City pilgrimages we happened to be on (Frango Mints, Lincoln Park Zoo, ribs @ Twin Anchors).  

Uncle Rube and his brothers had made a fortune during the Great Depression funneling ready cash to buy distressed assets.  They piled on by owning and operating one of the largest printing businesses in the City. For my bar mitzvah, Uncle Rube gifted me an embossing press.  

“You can always make sure if anyone borrows a book, they’ll give it back to you”, he explained.  I guess the idea was I would build up my own quasi-presidential library of books, each with the words “from the desk of Adam J. Brownstein” forever indented on to its pages. 

My mom always said that Aunt Sydelle and Uncle Rube were “well to do”, noting the regal nature of their apartment as Article A of confirming evidence.  Spread across the drawing room were Tiffany lamps, urns adorned in platinum fillary, original art (was that a Hockney in the corner?) and carpets from the Sha himself.  

But what I remember the most was the furniture, specifically a fine silk sofa with complimentary sitting chairs.  I was never certain what hue the silk actually was because all four pieces were covered in heavy plastic. I imagined that anyone who sat upon the sofa in shorts or a skirt would be victim to heavy sweating replete with the eery, squeaky sound of skin on plastic.  I say “imagine” because I never actually witnessed anyone actually sitting on the sofa.  

One day I confronted Aunt Sydelle about this problem.  

“The sofa seems really nice.  Maybe it’s the nicest thing in your whole apartment.  So WHY is it A) covered in industrial strength plastic and B) off limits???” I posited.

“When Kissinger comes to visit, then we can take off the plastic,” retorted my aunt.  “Kissinger . . . or perhaps the Queen of England.”  

Like any nine-year-old boy I was familiar with Henry Kissinger.  And later that afternoon I stole away into my uncle’s study to dig into their Encyclopedia Britannica to learn about who the Queen of England was.

Ever since that time with Aunt Sydelle I’ve been fascinated by what people will suffer through in life . . . by choice.  My relatives, like many, many other German Jews in the Midwest, chose to never sit on their own sofas in the hope that someday the Maharaja would come around for tea. 

Here in Tokyo, people surfer all the time.  It’s sort of a chic hobby, at least for most of my neighbors and Japanese machatunim.  For example, my own family has five humans in it, and we all share less than a thousand square feet of space.  It feels so small that we have to step outside just to change our mind! Yet, our house was OUR decision. Who knew?

And then there’s my neighbor.  Let’s call her “Mrs. O”. She’s a spry 85’ish homemaker, and every morning when I return from my dawn run around Komazawa Park I exchange a hearty “O-hayo gozaimasu” with her.  While I’m schvitzing and cooling down, she’s beating the bushes in front of her tidy town home. From there, she dutifully sweeps up the new fallen leaves along with those that found the ground the night before.  

Oba-chan next door – Each day you sweep fallen leaves – For who? Kissinger?

It’s a small, subtle uptick in curb appeal, and to the casual passerby it’s frankly hard to notice.  But around my neighborhood and my ward and my city, you’ll find an armada of Mrs. O’s, broom in hand . . . j

. . . just in case Henry Kissinger shows up.