The Black Chair

  Mr. Evan stopped by the shop yesterday, he is an older fellow in his seventies, light dark skin, gray tight hair. He all ways has his rumpled up ball cap upon his head, askew just a little off to the right and those big plastic frame glasses slightly thick always needing to be cleaned.  Well Mr. Evan has work here since before this building was built and I’ve learned that’s thirty plush years, him self he boasts forty-two years, when you ask him.
    Well he comes up pulling a cart, with this chair on it.  I recognize the chair as being one of the black out-side chairs from one of three places, the back deck where most of the people that work in this building pass by on their way in from the parking lot every mourning then again that evening returning to their vehicles of choice to go for the day.  And let’s not forget the lunch traffic, all those people moving about just conducting themselves everyday.    The second place around the building this black out-door chair could have come from was the cafeteria patio where people can sit and enjoy their lunches that they may have brought from home or may have picked up at the cafeteria before coming out. Some people come out here to just enjoy the day if it’s a nice one.    The third place this out-side black chair may have come from is the very front of the building. This is where the public has to gain access to the building and its services.  So Mr. Evan comes over he asked me if I would fix a place on the back of this chair it has a broken a spot right under the left side arm. Just at a glimpse, I let him know that I would fix it and that I would com and find him later on as to when he might come by to pick it up.  Nodding his head he picks the chair up and places it in the area I’m pointing at.  He sets this chair down in such a manner that to me was gentle and somewhat thoughtful as if this black metal chair were injured and in need of care, giving such respect to a chair, I found this odd.  He then takes hold of the cart that the chair was transported on and off he goes.  I finish what I was doing and go over to take a good look at the chair.
    I then ask one of my men to fetch me a service truck with a torch set on it.  While he starts to move in this direction I take a walk down to the boiler room area to see if I might find a piece of a brazing rod, it contains brass and tin this will help in mending this broken place on the chair.    As I’m walking down I start thinking about this chair and what has it see or even heard.  I image this chair being on the cafeteria patio were it would have witness many a good lunch getting eaten by building staff and the public a like.  Maybe a young dark completed lady having a salad, talking to her mother on her pink cell phone about the new friend in her life, smiling, her course long dark hair just lifts as the wind hits her face gentle, just so as she sits in this chair laughing out loud at her mother’s inquisitive questions about things that she knew her mother would ask, things like: Does he work and where?  How long have you been seeing each other?  Is he nice?  The whole time she’s twisting her fork around in her salad not getting a chance to take a bite, twisting her fork as she nods her head yes as if her mother were sitting next to her, to see this and she smiles widely as she answers her mother’s questions tying to return to her lunch but not succeeding very well, twisting her fork, nodding her head. 
  Now two friends that take turns buying each other coffee on occasion, each taking a seat, talking about home, the ball game, one having that big date eager to kiss and tell and the other eager to listen, setting, sipping, talking, in this chair, some of the kids from the local grade school right down the street sit here and have lunch with volunteers and staff these people just spend a little time with them, to see them smile and laugh, talking and mentoring, just really taking the time to listen has such an impact on who they become, in this chair perhaps.
      My mind frees up when my ears catch the very familiar squeaking sound of my service truck as it moves down the hill to the loading dock area and the shop.  The fellow I sent up has all ready set up what tools I need to make repairs to this chair with.  He has hooked up the oxygen and acetylene hose to each cylinder bottle of gas and pulled the hoses out, has a nice small brazing tip on the barrel of the torch, gas turned on and the regulators set, a striker, wielding cloves, the thick blue pair I like, and some high gloss black paint.  These were laid out on the back of the truck near the open tailgate waiting.
  At a glance I’m ready.  Turning to the chair I let myself take it in, the chair is all metal, and except for the now missing rubber pads that were once clued to the feet, it has worn well.  A higher end outside chair in price, I’m guessing.  The chair has an elegant look, with the back being a rounded harp shape, leaning back from bottom up then extending out like an open flower pedal, its not made solid, but with pinky finger sized diamond shaped holes, like a grate.  The back sets up high and hits most folks comfortably it has no real armrest but kind of wraps around the person when they are seated in it.  This small finger sized diamond shaped gate is also in the seat its back end is slightly curved flat an extends under the back of the chair some, then coming to the front making a neat roll down an round, hitting you just behind the knee nicely.
    Legs and frame are made with gentle sweeping curves, front legs with a soft “S” shape to them, rounding up to except the seat front and back then having a straight down back leg. The feet at the bottom of theses legs are about two inches round and thick, once having a nice rubber pad, but long since gone from use, people sliding them around, I would think.
    The finish is thick gloss black, I see this from the clipped paint on the legs and frame, it has faded some but not all that bad, worn to a polish at the seat and back were pepole make contact with their seats and backs.
    The break on the back of the chair, has happened at a piece of steel that finishes out the backing grate, also giving a place to attach the back to the frame which in turn gives the back its shape.  Picking up the chair to put it on the truck gate, it has some weight to it and is strong, rigid when moving with it.  Setting it up on the truck on its side made it look out of sorts, it seemed to be yearning to be up-righted again back on its own feet.  The fellow that fetched the equipment take’s hold of the frame of the chair while I pull and bend this broken place past were it had been, then push it back in place right at its break, leaving just a fracture now.  My fellow starts to release the frame of the chair and the chairs fears are founded it starts to tip and my fellow has to regain a hold while I weight down one of chairs feet with a block of steel, that’s better, an my fellow moves off, leaving to help with others, while I make this repair. 
      After setting the break and placing the block, I look to find that the other side of the back of this chair had also previously and almost at same spot but on the opposite side and has been mended in a similar fashion, with the same techniques and tools just a different person making the mend, Did this person before me notice the things about this chair that I have like its shape, how it was made, the weight or even the feet pads being gone, did they ponder from were in the building this chair come from.  I don’t know, just wondering.
    My glove fits well on my right hand it felt heavy, thick it is a newer pair, but slightly used, still soft and supple moving with my hand easy and nice.  Gas on, striker in hand, I strike once, then twice a flame comes to life it’s a dirty flame, dark black smoke really sooty.  I turn up the oxygen the flame draws back to the tip, changing from dirty sooty orange red, to a crystal clean, clear light blue flame in just a blink.  I pick up the brazing rod that I fetch from the boiler room earlier.  It had that familiar talcum feel to it in my ungloved hand, smooth and clean. It’s the flux on the outside of the rod that gives this feel. 
  As I start heating this broken spot my hands an mind take over as the paint start to turn to ash then just to nothingness, I think about the chair being on the back deck were most of the staff come in and out of this entrance to the building every day multiple times a day, people always moving.  This is also the smoking lounge for the staff.  What have these chairs been part of, all those people with thoughts that are theirs when taking a brake from it all. Maybe one of the regulars sits in this chair every day, dependent on the comfort it brings as she searches through her handbag looking for her cigarette’s and lighter.  Her shoulder length blond to brown hair gently free-falls into her eyes, interrupting her search, the right hand comes back to pull it away from her view and tuck it behind her ear just so, now she continues her search finding her lighter this is after removing her day-planner and placing it alongside her bigger than normal purse.  After collecting her lighter and setting it on the table she now removes several other items, checkbook, some bills that need to be paid rubber banded together, her lunch all before finding her smoke’s, which she laid to the side of the lighter on the table.  She takes the time to return the things she removed from the bag starting with her lunch then the other items before lighting a cigarette and drawing in hard, now thinking to herself that she should quit someday.  Out of the corner of her hair free eye, there is something there and she turns her eyes to focus in on this now, it is a friend she knows from the first floor, front desk.  She smiles and politely waves, this makes the smoke from her cigarette at first wave in time with her movements then it begins to weave into its self, loosing the fine straight shape it had and just becoming smoke in the air, her front desk friend waves and smiles as she continues her inbound path to the building.
  Her gaze now looks into herself as she draws on the smoke again now thinking of her girls.  Thinking of what was to take place that evening going over their schedules again mentally in her mind, thinking about the morning conversations with them over breakfast while she packed lunches, in her doing this she came to her earlier conclusion as when she followed this same train of thought just after dropping them at school, she would be able to welcome up a more quiet evening for once, eight o’clock this evening, instead of the usual, the van not getting cut off till around nine something.  This brings a small devilish smile to her face and she exhales letting me let the thought of her drift away as the smoke from the chair whisks up from the flame in my hand bringing me back to focused on what my hands are doing and what my eyes are seeing. Not what my mind wants to see.