THEY USED TO SAY ABOUT Joe DiMaggio that centerfield in Yankee Stadium was where triples went to die. You could hit the ball 460 feet, up into the Bronx wind and the gods themselves — but if Joe was out there, it didn’t matter. He’d glide under it like gravity bent to his will.
Well, in my house, we have a new burgundy Ethan Allen sofa — and this, my friends, is where divorces go to die.
Now don’t let the velvet fool you. This isn’t some decorative afterthought from a showroom. This sofa has history. This sofa is part Greek chorus, part Vegas showgirl, part therapist. It’s the kind of sofa you want to sink into when you’ve burned the pot roast and your partner just reminded you (again) about that time you left the dog at the groomer overnight. It’s lush. Regal. Sinfully comfortable. And yes — it was originally $1,650, but I got it for $250 and a mild existential crisis.
Let me explain.
A few years back, during one of those periods where my marriage felt less “’til death do us part” and more “who gets the dog and the coffee maker,” I started browsing for apartments on the LA Westside. A one-bedroom caught my eye: skylight, fireplace, hardwood floors. It whispered new beginning. And then, I found her. The sofa. Blood red. Carved wood. The lovechild of Edith Wharton and Ricardo Montalbán.
I thought, “This is it. I’ll sleep on it until I can afford a bed. Maybe write my next book on it. Maybe cry a little.” But then — as happens in most relationships that have outlived their warranties — the storm passed. We didn’t split up. We made dinner. Watched Jeopardy. Argued about the dishwasher. Love is weird like that.
I never got the apartment. I never got the couch.
Flash forward to two weeks ago. My wife, bless her heart, announces she’s found a “fabulous red couch” on Facebook Marketplace — but she’s not sure I’ll like it. She shows me the photo, and I nearly drop my phone. It’s the couch. The very same one. Still in pristine condition. Like it had been waiting for me, untouched by time, destiny, or toddlers.
I nodded coolly. “Yeah, it’s nice. If you love it, I’m good with it.” Inside, I was laughing like a man who just found his long-lost soulmate doing burlesque in Manhattan Beach.
So we drive out to meet the sellers. And would you believe it — it’s the guy who created Hellboy. Yes, that Hellboy. The red demon with the stone fist and the soul of a poet. Apparently, things are a little tight in the comic-book empire these days. They’re unloading their Manhattan Beach dream house piece by piece.
The couch had been barely used. “We never sat in the living room,” Hellboy’s dad tells me, sipping something organic out of a very defeated-looking mug. “It’s basically new.”
Reader, we bought it.
And now, there it sits in our living room — crimson and confident, like it knows it dodged a fate worse than Craigslist. My wife thinks it was her idea. I let her. Marriage, after all, is a long series of things you knew before they did but pretended not to.
A week later, she starts eyeing a new Queen Anne dining set, also on Facebook Marketplace. Our current table, she points out, is “ruined.” (The boys, in their youth, treated it like a stunt ramp.) The one she wants is listed by a film director “transitioning out of the industry.” Which is L.A. code for “My last pilot didn’t get picked up, and now I sell furniture to men who think they’re winning arguments.”
And here’s the thing — I don’t feel guilty. Sure, it’s a tough time in Hollywood. There are actors driving Ubers, showrunners ghostwriting tech bros’ memoirs, and screenwriters selling mid-century floor lamps for gas money. But I’m not a vulture.
I’m a curator.
I’m preserving the artifacts of failed dreams and faded development deals. I'm giving them a second life. Like DiMaggio, I’m tracking down the long flies of someone else’s glory days and gently cradling them back to earth.
So yes — I sit on that sofa. Sometimes sideways. Sometimes with a bourbon. And every now and then, I whisper to it, “You were meant for me. You just had to wait until the marriage stabilized.”
And it whispers back, “Shhh. You’re home now.”
TONY CASTRO, the former award-winning Los Angeles columnist and author, is a writer-at-large and the national political writer for LAMonthly.org. He is the author of nine books, including his new debut novel, THE BOOK OF MARILYN. He can be reached at tony@tonycastro.com.
Tagline options (choose one or let’s invent a new one together):
✨ “All sales are final — especially the ones that save your marriage.”
✨ “In this house, we sit on art and irony.”
✨ “Facebook Marketplace: Where somebody else’s dream becomes your perfect seat.”
✨ “The sofa where divorces — and DiMaggio triples — go to die.”
