We got a phone call from one of my wife’s former co-workers at Dillard’s while we were on the train coming back from Chicago. We had to be at the station early Saturday morning to catch the train back to St. Louis, so we only had time to get up and have a quick breakfast before heading out. The call was from the furniture manager.
While she had worked there, my wife had picked out a sofa that she wanted for the loft. It was too expensive, but she got an employee discount and the furniture often went on sale. When she resigned and we still hadn’t been able to buy it, we told him that if it ever went on clearance to call us.
We didn’t expect to be on a train in another state when he did, but that was the day it got marked down, and we knew that it would probably go fast. Earlier, we had tried to do the same with a leather recliner and it had been sold before we could get there. I explained where we were and offered to give my credit card number over the phone if necessary, but he said he would mark it sold and make sure that we got it.
The train crossed the river into St. Louis right around lunchtime, and our beautiful city had never seemed more inviting. We decided to drive to The Hill for lunch at Guido’s, the same place we had gone with my daughter the day the tide began to turn for our marriage. It seemed only fitting after a spectacular weekend of restoration in Chicago.
We made the drive home in the afternoon and went straight to the mall to pay for the sofa. In the meantime, I had listed what we called “the mushroom,” an odd shaped sofa/loveseat sort of piece of furniture on Craigslist, as it would have to go to make room for the new couch. We wouldn’t be able to pick up our new one until I could borrow a truck, so we had a little time to work with.
As a final stop before going home, we pulled into the Steak and Shake near our loft for peppermint shakes. My wife loves all things peppermint, but will almost never eat or drink any outside of the Christmas season. The shakes signaled the unofficial beginning of the season for us, and allowed the glow of the trip to linger for just a little longer.
It was important from a memories and association standpoint (and especially for my mental health) to replace a lot of the furniture and change the appearance of the loft. We needed to make it our place, not the place my wife had lived while we were separated. Someone came that very night and bought the mushroom, clearing the way for us to pick our new couch up the following afternoon. We had already gotten a new dining room table, and just those two things changed the loft a lot.
We got some other surprise blessings that helped us finish the process just about the time we were getting ready to move. I hadn’t wanted to breach the subject, since the loft we were living in was the one she had picked out, but even with the changes, it was difficult for me to live there. Fortunately, between her understanding, and a growing frustration with the property manager’s lack of response to any of our maintenance requests, she was all too willing to begin looking for an upgrade with me. By moving into a brand new loft together, we would be able to leave behind all of the reminders of what had happened, and free ourselves from some troublesome issues related to our past.
Right before our move, I got an extraordinary deal at Macy’s on a new bedding set. There was also a black leather recliner there that I wanted, and I had been waiting for it to go on clearance, much like we had waited for the couch at Dillard’s. One of the people I worked with told me that she had bought one recently and now didn’t need it, and would be willing to sell it to me at a fraction of the cost of a new one. I was able to buy it, and buy the floor model (it did go on clearance at about the same time), so we had matching chairs to complete our new living room set.
Those kinds of blessings have been common throughout this entire year. We just take them as that much more evidence that God is with us in the process of restoring our marriage. The New Testament teaches that marriage is symbolic of God’s love for His church, called “The Bride of Christ” in the scriptures. He is very interested in not only saving our marriage and making it strong, but also in doing the same for anyone else who will give Him the opportunity.
The Restoration Tour 