Couching the Void

A living room expedition, like any other project, should not be undertaken without clear goals in mind. Sure, you could just decide to hang out in the living room without thinking about what you're going to accomplish there. Some people might even argue that this "relaxation" approach is best; that the living room is a place where the pressure to perform should be removed, and the soul allowed time to recuperate from stress and come to peace with the environment. Those people are losers.

No, you've only got one go-round on this world, so you'd better make the most out of it, and that means you can't dawdle around wasting time. Now that doesn't mean you can't relax. Far from it. Rest and recuperation are important. But precisely because they are important, they can't be left to chance. If I'm going to rest, then I'm going to do it right.

So, what are the goals of this living room expedition? In my case, there's one obvious overriding goal: make my hip better. "Relaxing" is all very nice, but unless it's going to help my hip get better, it isn't going to fly. For instance, I find taking bike rides relaxing, but right now that would make my hip worse. Especially because in my current Vicodin state, I would probably bike right into a tree.

Since making my hip better is the most important thing, everything else flows from that requirement. My doctor tells me that keeping weight off of it is the key thing, so I need a good place to sit that will minimize the strain I put on the hip. Fortunately, modern technology has the answer: the La-Z-Boy recliner. The LZB is perfect. It's easy to get into from a pair of crutches, supports your feet, allows you to sit up for TV watching and video game playing, but lets you lie back to take a nap without having to move at all. This is a key piece of recuperation equipment.

Unfortunately, I didn't have one. Like most guys who like to play video games and watch TV (which is to say, really, most guys), I wanted one. I had wanted one since I first laid eyes on one as a small child. But somehow my girlfriend didn't. Something about them being ugly. I didn't see how that mattered, but evidently some people take aesthetics into account when selecting furniture. I thought that perhaps she was overlooking the inner beauty of a device that was so perfectly designed to bring joy and comfort to the modern human.

But sadly, we live in a cruel world that is shallow and appearance-oriented, so the poor LZB gets discriminated against just because it's a bit ungainly looking and overweight. She had put her foot firmly down, and that foot was not budging. My arguments fell upon deaf ears. So I went without, and was forced to sit on a tasteful but non-reclining Pottery Barn couch to watch TV.

Obviously, I should have thought of the "what if I develop painful arthritis and have hip surgery" argument sooner. Now it was clear an LZB was exactly what I needed. Had I known this earlier, I would have pretended to be in extreme pain whenever I stood up and sat down.

Ironically, given her opposition to the LZB, it was my girlfriend who wound up supplying one. Her friend's parents had one in a guest room, and were happy to loan it to us for a month or two. She had gone from being the LZB's biggest foe to its primary enabler. So now we have one, and it's perfect. It's soft and cushy, and leans back and forward at my every whim. It even has a seat heater and massage function! My life is now complete.

Sure, it's temporary...in theory. But I figure that once the LZB has its foot in the door, and does such a great job helping her boyfriend feel whole again, she won't be able to coldly dismiss it. How could she kick out something that brought such relief to someone close to her?

There's a lesson here. I should probably remember this kind of domestic jiu-jitsu technique in the future. I wonder what kind of ailment I would have to fake to get a coffee table that I can put drinks on without coasters?