You never know who you'll meet

Whenever I have the opportunity to meet someone from an auction I jump at the chance. It's exciting, a mystery, and I've already created a whole person in my imagination from a few emails...sometimes, I'm surprised.

A son was selling an antique sofa for his mother in San Francisco and most of my emails and dealings were with him.It was of french design and had "harbor grey" silk upholstery...it was just lovely. It was truly a challenge to have the sofa delivered to my house because the seller lived on Lombard Street (yes, that Lombard street...the most crookedest...) and a huge moving van was going to have problems any way you looked at it. Luckily, it all worked out and arrived safely.
When I told the seller I was going to be traveling to San Francisco, he suggested a lunch with his mother and himself to celebrate the purchase and arrival of the sofa. I thought it was a splendid idea. Although my friends were a bit leery that I would meet a "stranger" in a big city I assured them that things would be fine. After all, his mother was coming along.

From the moment they arrived to pick me up at my hotel in the city I knew this would be one of the more memorable lunches I would ever have. A petite, blond, stylish ,older woman was driving her Mercedes 450SL with her 6 foot 2 inch dread locked native Maori (a New Zealand aboriginal warrior) son beside her. I was told that the son was adopted (ya think??) sometime during lunch. What a trio we must have looked like.

During my San Francisco tour the two took me across the Golden Gate Bridge to Sausalito for lunch, we toured secret spots from a resident's point of view, and ended up in their fabulous home on Lombard.The views were of the San Francisco bay...hence the "harbor grey" on the sofa. It was a most unusual but wonderful day. Although the sofa did not stay at my home (sold it a few months later on Ebay) the memories will always reside.