Sunbonnet Soliloquy

By Jewell Ellen Smith

55 Chairs and a Riddle

Here is a riddle for you!

Some years back, when riddles were a popular guessing game, the usual rule was that three clues were given and three guesses were allowed. But this riddle is so simple you should solve it immediately. So, lean back in your chair, prop up your feet, and see if you can’t guess it the first dash out of the box!

Here’s the first clue, and it’s free -- doesn’t count:

We have 55 of these items at our house, and you probably have a good supply.

First real clue: it is a common, useful, man-invented item. But some animals take to them and like them.

Second clue: some are fancy, others plain. The best ones are very inviting. In other words, we’re drawn to them. Their colors, sizes, shapes, and materials vary, but these items are all alike in that they have a common purpose. They may be placed in any room of the house. Yet some are made for out of doors.

Third and final clue: It Is said this item was invented “the day man tired of squatting on his haunches!”

Chairs!

Of course! And there’s much to be said for chairs. Especially rocking chairs. They--

“You wish I’d explain about the 55 chairs at my house?...

“Why, sure! I’ll be glad to, and I’ll show them to you. But that may take some time. You see, (husband) Smitty and I’ve been 41 years gathering them together, and there’s a long tale associated with each chair -- not to mention the memories that could come stealing in as I dust off those crammed in the attic and those wedged between the rafters of the barn.

“There’s even the danger that I might get plum sentimental if I showed you the plain maple dining room chair -- the only one left of that set Smitty’s rich uncle gave us when we were first married. Most folks dream of having a rich uncle. We had one! Uncle Joe. Poor Uncle Joe was blind, but he was a delightful person. That was way before WWII, before Smitty came into the Army. He was working on a newspaper down in the Cajun corner of Louisiana. I was fresh out of L.S.U. and writing for the Baton Rouge Morning Advocate... All the rest of that maple set was broken or burned when our furniture was being shipped to Formosa in the late 50’s. Our things were in a train wreck and fire. But that was a good tour. Being in the Far East two years was very educational...

“You think that old rocker there in the corner looks like the one Whistler’s Mother was sitting in when he painted the famous portrait?...

“Yes, it does! I hadn’t noticed that before! Ah, that chair! I bought it at a furniture auction in Washington, D.C. for two dollars! I used to rock our kids to sleep in that chair. Nan and Wiley, that is. Chubby little Dave never got rocked to sleep. Then, we didn’t have a rocking chair. Couldn’t afford one. A second lieutenant’s take home pay was only $183.00 per month.

“And besides, that was the decade when it was considered very bad for a baby to rock him to sleep. It would ‘spoil’ him. You were supposed to plunk him down in his bed, tell him ‘good-night, sweet dreams’ and walk out! Never mind if he cried and cried.

“Now, I’m sure it’s a good thing to sing a lullaby to a little fellow as the sun is going down and rock him off to meet the Sandman. The woman who has not rocked a baby to sleep has not lived!...

“If it hadn’t been for that two dollar Washington, D.C. rocker, I might never have learned to drive an automobile. One morning Nan climbed up on the dresser, tumbled off, and banged her forehead on the edge of that chair. Cut quite a gash. But I couldn’t drive the car so it was five or six hours before her dad came home from the Pentagon and we got her to the clinic. The pediatrician chewed me out royally for not bringing her in sooner. He said there would be a scar, and that a pretty little girl didn’t deserve a scar in the middle of her forehead! Within six weeks I had a Virginia driver’s license!

“That little red rocker there in the boys’ room? It was Dave’s... Yes, he finally got in some rocking. Plenty of it. During WWII, when he was a toddler, there was such a shortage of metal that you couldn’t buy a child the traditional little red wagon for Christmas. But in south Arkansas where we lived there were plenty of red wooden rockers. Smitty wrote (from London) that I should tell Santa to bring Dave a rocker. I did... It faded and got banged up as we were transferred from one post to another. But Nan rocked herself and her dolls in it. We took it with us to Germany. And when Wiley came along, Smitty refurbished and repainted it...

“That was all a long time ago. I can scarcely believe how long ago it was. The rocker looks the same, but the kids who sat in it don’t! Earlier this summer we watched Wiley lift his right hand and take the Hippocratic Oath and then lift it again as he was sworn into the U.S. Army Medical Corps...

“The scar on Nan’s forehead?...

“It faded away. She is a lovely lady now. A PhD. kind of lady, a chemist...

“Dave? Oh, Dave is a pediatrician. And I hope he is advising all the young mothers who bring their children to him to buy rocking chairs and rock their babies to sleep!

“Some other time I’ll explain about those other 52 chairs. It’s your turn to tell me a riddle!”

Published August 1980. Click your browser’s ‘Back’ button to return.