I have reached the stage of middle age where I will absolutely, without even a hint of shame, pull over to the side of the road to look at someone else’s trash furniture. And I mean really…can you blame me? Because sometimes you find this!

Which, admittedly, this is the ‘after an hour with a magic eraser and a whole lot of wood oil’ picture, but still, is that not radiant? I think it’s gotta be about 150 years old, and it’s shockingly sturdy and surprisingly comfortable, even for my rather ample fundament.

Did I fill in the missing bronze (brass? some sort of metal, I have no idea) on the back with half a bottle of my sparkly-est glitter gel nail polish? Yes. Do I have any shame? No. (It will pop out with a toothpick if I ever want it out, which I don’t, because it fills my heart with joy…if you find yourself looking for pearls to clutch, please rest assured I have no intention of vandalizing anyone else’s roadside trash treasure, only my own.)

The only tricky bit is there were two…and the second is in much rougher shape. Someone did something unspeakable with wood filler (yes, I realize the irony of complaining about this having just confessed my nail polish crimes, no that does not make me like the wood filler any more or the nail polish any less). And the caning on the seat is in rough shape.

So this one is sitting in my garage for the moment while I wait to accumulate the effort and attention pellets to do something about it. Because I think I can get that wood filler out with either mineral spirits or nail polish remover…and I think I can reinforce the seat with linen yarn…and I know I can clean up the wood.