Saying Good-Bye to an Old Friend: My High Top Table

Yesterday, while watching the Artemis II craft do their lap around the moon I had to say good bye to an old friend who has supported me for 17-years and followed me from Florida to Las Vegas and ending here in Portland. When I bought my townhouse in Florida in 2009 I found this great high top table at Costco and had to have it. I guess it reminded me of all the great bars I’ve visited over the years and making it part of my first home purchase seemed like a great idea and it’s been my main dining table since. Here’s the first image that I have of the high top table (on the left) with the giant sectional couch that totally swallowed up that living room.

Ten years into our journey, around 2019, the stools started showing wear and tear and I decided to replace them with a couple black stools that featured a pneumatic switch that would take the seat up to the height needed for this high top table. Alas, I didn’t know that these kinds of stools are notorious for their inability to keep the seat at its top setting and soon they started failing and I found myself sitting at my high top table like I was a little kid too short to be sitting at the adults’ table.

I had been thinking of parting ways with the high top table with I moved to Portland, but at the last minute I decided that it deserved another chance (with stools that worked). So off to Portland we went and once there I ordered a couple stools from Amazon made of wood, set at the correct height. When I first set up the high top table I had it facing into the kitchen area and that kind’a worked but it was comically tall for my small space and made the small kitchen feel even smaller.

But the first thing that I noticed was that it was quite a step to get my butt into the stool seat. I don’t remember it being an issue when I first got said table with the original stools. And the last few years I’d pop into the seat and then use the hydraulic switch to adjust to the proper height. I don’t know, this was different and I found that I really had to extend my toes to reach the ground when getting off the stools. And because I couldn’t reach the floor when sitting on the stools, I had to grab the table and scoot myself in and that was putting a lot of pressure on the very thin legs and I sensed a growing amount of wobbliness on the stools as the days went by. It was only a matter of time when either I’d make a miscalculation getting off the stool or the wobbliness would cause me and it to come down to the ground. I rotated the table to face the wall and window, but I was still uncomfortable with how hard it was to get in and jump down from the stools.

So, as much as I’ve loved my high top table, it’s time for grandpa to not risk an unnecessary fall trying to jump up or down from his favorite table. During my Sunday drive I swung by IKEA and got a nice table and chairs replacement that will get the job done without risking bodily harm. The new table and chairs also fits my very small space a bit better without comically overwhelming my tiny breakfast nook/space. Yay.