A Farmhouse Table That Dug A Well In Haiti

Have you ever had a farmhouse table that dug a well in Haiti?

I have one and it is AAAHHH MAAAAZING!

My friend said, “Hey, I’m having a yard sale of items that people have donated to me. Stop by if you get a chance.”

So I stopped. And I plundered through faded cookbooks from the 80’s and paperback romances and an OLD gold embossed hard back filled with Edgar Guest poems. I passed over Tupperware missing lids and cheese graters and mismatched silverware. There were magazines and pictures and tablecloths, well just about any castaway might have been there.

Then I spotted it…the farmhouse table that dug a well in Haiti…the legs were folded…and my brown eyes locked with a steady gaze as I slowly moved in the direction of the tent leg supporting the folded farmhouse table that dug a well in Haiti.

And with a string quartet playing an angelic overture in my mind, I moved in slow motion toward the table. Sorta

My sweet precious Tiffany snapped me from my focused slow motion reverie toward the table. “Mom!!! Mom! you really want that table don’t you?”

“Yes,” I said, hanging my head just a little to try to discipline myself to turn and walk away.

And then I heard one of the yard sale worker-men say,

“Oh! Hey, you want this table? Let me set it up for you!”

So he unfolded the legs that supported the tabletop. The old rusty hinges worked perfectly. With a quick wobble motion of one leg of the table he settled all four table legs on the ground. It was imperfectly and perfectly straight and beautiful.

And I heard angels singing with the string quartet as I carefully slid the palm of my hand across the blemishes and stains and scratches.

The yard sale worker-man, said, “It’s only $5.” And almost like the boomerang filter on Instagram, I said, “I’ll take it!”

We’d just moved. We didn’t want to move another single piece of furniture.

But hey, it folded nice and flat and the mere 7′ x 4′ tabletop (more or less) slid nicely into place in the back of the SUV with the help of the yard sale worker-man.

Tiffany quietly mumbled, “Dad’s gonna wonder what you’re gonna to do with this thing.”

“I know, but he’ll love it when he sees how I set it up”, I exclaimed with excited emphasis on the LOVE IT part!

And he did.

It’s the perfect blend of old and rustic and stained and dented with edges that are worn away and ragged. It has rusty hinges with spring loaded pulls which release the legs to fold or unfold…depending on your need for it.

Its height is great for eating family dinners and finishing sewing projects for High School Chemistry (yes Chemistry) at 2 a.m. and for hanging out while putting puzzles together on a lazy holiday afternoon. It’s Grand Central Station when it comes to wrapping Christmas gifts.

It really does look like it’s been to Haiti and back…and dug a well.

It’s imperfectly perfect…to me.

I’ve scrubbed it and cleaned it and bleached it and uncovered wonderful stories.

The other day I told you about being a crazy band mom and the best advice ever. I just love it when one person joins a team that does so much more as a team than one could ever possibly do alone. Many times the energy of a group in motion far surpasses the expected outcome. You can read about making a difference here.

My friend, that was having the yard sale, has an amazing ability to figure out ways to benefit others. She just knows how to “rally the troops” so to speak! She can figure out ways to raise funds in the most simple and extra-ordinary ways.

So after a particularly busy yard sale Saturday, she went around to different sales at the end of the day. She asked each person if they were planning to donate their left over items and if they were, could she take it off their hands, because she was raising funds to dig a well in Haiti. She’s done several relief projects for Haiti.

And bless her sweet heart. People were thrilled for her to carry away their leftover yard sale stash…including my $5 table.

She’s brilliant, I tell ya. BRILLIANT!! I wish I woulda thought of that.

I haven’t personally dug a well in Haiti. But every time I look at my imperfectly perfect table, I realize that I have helped, with the purchase of the imperfectly perfect farmhouse table. And it makes me think of ways to team up with others to do more together than I can on my own.

You may feel like the small amount that you do doesn’t matter much. And you may feel so very very ordinary. Look all around. There are so many fabulous ways to be extra!

Extra-ordinary.

And ordinary table is extra. Extra-ordinary!

Even a farmhouse table that dug a well in Haiti!

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