Broken Chair

In the upstairs hallway of the Art’s building, at the alcove leading towards the professor’s office suit, there is a chair with a hand written message, “broken chair”, taped to its cloth cushioned back. I notice it had been sitting in the very same spot for a couple of months now. It’s difficult to ignore; it’s right next to the entrance to the mens room door.  I wondered how long before the maintenance crew would take it away?  The broken chair sat silent, as a statue to neglected necessity which quietly fades into its general surroundings.  Referencing its appearance from “Who broke the chair?” to “Whose chair is that?” finally, and ultimately, the state of permanence is obtained when used as a reference point; “…go past the broken chair, then take an immediate right; my office is the second one down from there.” 

   I use to ignore that broken chair.  Then, I began to notice its presence more whenever I stopped by the restroom between classes.  I suddenly realized that I started counting down the number of class meetings I had remaining in the semester by how often I passed that broken chair; a silent witness to my investment towards a degree.  Or could it be my quickening to awareness of the details in my situation?  I am certain no one placed it there to remain there as its assigned place, with its rough scribbled notice, as an intentional caution as well as a basic statement of truth.  It would be so cool to consider it as an art project.  Where some genius from the Andy Warhol school of social art had set it all up as a commentary about broken expectations languishing in the hallways of the intellectual highway in scholarly ambition.  That’d be so out of the predictability inculcated into the rhythm of university pace; way too deep for my psychology friends to consider as possible, and way too obscure for my philosophy buds to embrace as authentically plausible.  Somewhere in-between I guess.  A student mother rushes by with her five year old in tow; scurrying little legs labored to keep up with her mother’s frantic pace.  The child looked at the chair, and pointed in the direction of the unexpected; noticing me watching, she smiled; then laughed.  As if she had solved an oblique riddle.