DIY

What Is It – Illusions or Delusions!

She unloaded the misshapen coat rack from her auction finds. “Hmm, she thought, what to do?” This one would be a challenge, for sure.

She was just beginning her new business. She studied the old wooden coat rack and remembered that towel trees had become the latest ‘rage’. Why not she thought!

She refinished it carefully, removing the wooden hooks and adding gorgeous aged bronze hooks. It was beautiful! She stepped back and looked around; she had an old file cabinet with no new ideas for it. She refinished it to match the new ‘towel tree,’ repurposing it into a bath cabinet with hardware that matched the new hooks on the towel tree. It was perfect!

She advertised it with pictures. When her customers came to see this new idea, they all exclaimed, “Oh, look, here it is!” There was great excitement in the air!

Later that day a young family came in looking for furnishings for their young daughter who was moving into her first apartment.

“Oh look Daddy! It’s a towel tree!”

“That’s a coat rack!” The family had just moved to Florida from Pennsylvania. His wife rushed over and said, “I know it looks like a coat rack honey, but it’s not! These are in all the magazines now.”

Frustrated, the man snorted, “You too? You know this is a coat rack! We had one in our entry hall in Pennsylvania for 20 years like this! They just call it a towel tree in Florida because they don’t need coats!” His wife apologized to the shopkeeper for his ignorance. “You just can’t take the country out of him, he’s a farmer at heart!”

Soon, a woman came in and spent a great deal of time walking around the towel tree and the bath cabinet. She looked about mid 40’s, with softly curling hair; she was clearly interested in the new bath set.

“May I help you, the shopkeeper asked?”

The woman walked over closer to her and whispered, “I know this is a towel tree, and I think it is wonderful! But, my son just got a promotion and has his own office. I am looking for something to hang his racing jackets on to display them; and he could use a file cabinet. He could place his racing helmet on top. I think it could make a nice display about him in the new office. Do you think it could work?”

And so it goes with life; our best laid plans may go astray; but they still manifest into something useful!