Logic skills beyond compare

We considered moving several times over the past few years. Sometimes we've looked locally for a larger home and occasionally we've travelled out of state to seek greener pastures. One feature of a new home that is non-negotiable for me is a formal dining room.

The dining room set we now own was our very first major furniture purchase as a married couple. Most of what we started out with was (and still is) hand-me-downs or rejects. We shopped for weeks, unable to agree on what we wanted and what we could afford. I saw many tables and chairs that I liked, but I didn't feel like they would fit with our small home and hodge-podge of random furnishings.

We finally settled on a beautiful, modern design with an inlay pattern on the tabletop and the backs of the chairs. I loved it but my reservation was that it was too big and formal for the space it would be occupying (just a nook off the kitchen). I was persuaded, however, when Brett pointed out that we would not always be living in this home and eventually we would have more room for it.

Another factor to this purchase was the fact that we already owned a large piece of glass that would fit the tabletop almost perfectly. Because the design was not real wood, just a veneer, we knew we would need to protect it and a large piece of glass could be very expensive.

Fast forward to house hunting in Idaho years later. The realtor is becoming frustrated because I'm rejecting many of the homes he thinks would be perfect for us. (Apparently, homes with formal dining rooms are not as common as I think they are.) Being a helpful agent, he points out that it might not be a good idea to make a major decision like buying a home based on a piece of furniture that could easily be replaced.

Imagine his dismay when I explained that, since we bought the table specifically because we had a piece of glass that already fit it, we were in actuality buying a home around a piece of glass.

A piece of glass that no longer exists. It fell and shattered all over our dining room nook shortly after we bought the table.