The piano stands alone

I have spent the last year+ deconstructing the old 1957 house my brothers and I grew up in, doing my best to make sure that everything usable would be reused rather than going into a landfill. Of course, there were a few items I saved for myself--the door where my father marked everybody's height in pen as they grew, the hearth where generations placed their stockings with care, and a letter and plate of cookies for Santa almost every Christmas of the last 50+ years, and a few cinder blocks as mementos. Yet one item remains stubbornly unsold, un-given-away, and unclaimed: the piano.

Craigslist can work many wonders, but it turns out that selling a piano is very hard and that giving one away is just as hard. Every time I think I have someone willing to take it, they back out, can't scrape together enough able-bodied friends to help move it, or otherwise disappear.

So far I've saved the following itms from the garbage heap: furnishings—old tube radio/turntable, couch, ceiling fixtures, work bench, loveseat, CD player, floor model speakers, decorative drapery rods and much, much more; the washer/dryer, refrigerator, kitchen cabinets, bathroom cabinet and sink, interior doors, carpets and padding, furnaces and ductwork. You'd be surprised how many responses you get to a post titled "60-year-old couch"... many!

Since demolition has already started on the house, the piano is now sitting under a tarp in the driveway. If nothing comes through in time, it will be tipped into a dumpster. As Tom says, "Oh my." Tick tock, piano, somebody had better claim you soon!

December update: I have gotten a call about the piano almost every weekend, and still it remains. Through rain, snow, and ice it sitll holds its tune. But last week the rest of the house was demolished, and this week work on the new house is scheduled to begin in earnest.

Mary Florence