Once upon a time I woned a plaid jacket. It wasn't really a jacket, just a heavy man's shirt. But I used it for more than I've ever used any other garment in my life.
I got it on Thanksgiving in 2006. We were going to go for a walk around Gray's Lake and my Dad was worried that I was going to be cold. At the time I was prety anti-jacket and I kept telling him that I would be fine.
Anyway, Dad didn't want me to be cold so he brought out one of his old plaid shirts for me to wear. It was plaid on the outside with some weird, cold, smooth material on the inside...I don't know what to call it, but it was dark blue. Anyway, once I put on the jacket I fell in love with it. For some reason it just made me feel beautiful. Maybe it was just because deep down I felt really touched that my Dad had given it to me.
From Thanksgiving on, the plaid and I were inseperable. I wore it whenever I could get away with wearing it. Not even just when i was cold, but all the time. I think I even slept in it a couple of times.
So the days roll on...when February comes I'm forced to think about the physical status of the thing...it's got holes in it. The holes were always there, but now they're getting bigger. Buttons have fallen off. There are so many imperfections in the fabric that I can tell that I am going to have to throw it away soon, or watch it slowly destroy itself. My beloved plaid jacket: reduced to mere rags. But I couldn't bear to throw it away. Never. I needed a miracle.
One night I'm wearing it at one of my band concerts, over my uniform. I know that I can't wear it onstage so right before we go on I take it off and put it on a bench. I'll be able to find it after the concert. I know I will.
What happens next is the most magical part of the whole story. To the unbeliever it might seem as if a custodian had seen the rag of a thing sitting so near to a trashcan and thrown it away, assuming it was trash. Mayhaps that is what happened. I wouldn't blame anyone for assuming that thing was trash. But it's more likely that my plaid jacket pulled an Elijah: taken straight up into heaven without ever having to die. Personally, I like to think that it was taken to the lost and found, where someone else found it and made it their own, having just as much fun with it as I did. If my plaid can make someone else happy than it was worth losing it.
It's the mystery of the story that I like best. All I know is that when I cam back for it, it wasn't there. I'll never know what exactly happened to it, which is much better than having to finally bring myself to throw it away after it falls apart. I compare the story to that of Marilyn Monroe. She died young, in a mysterious way, so that she would remain young forever in our memories.
Sometimes I still miss my plaid jacket, but I was never sad about it being gone. I'll always have the memories.
