The Red Jacket

Our town has a garage sale weekend every year. This year, my son and a friend walked around looking at the garage sales and just hung out for a while. L’s dad only had a twenty dollar bill and he handed it over (way too much, and the kid just asked for a ten).  I suspect that nobody asked me because they know I'm not as nice about handing out $.  Sometimes his dad just LIKES the way it feels to be able to do for his son what his parents could never do for him.  I don't mind.  I find it touching as long as I also have a chance to teach L to use it wisely.

This garage sale plan, by the way, is something L’s friend “El” comes up with, "let's walk around"; not L's type of idea.  It can make H. nervous sometimes, but I like to see L get out of the house.

Assuming that L didn’t spend anything for a slushy, he paid almost $9 for three articles of clothing. What a gyp.

(Just learnt that “gyp” is derogatory and is derived from gypsy… who knew? Isn’t it strange that these things take on a life that goes way beyond the original prejudice? I couldn’t have been using the word as an indirect insult to gypsies because I didn’t know there was any connection; now that I know, I guess I have to stop using the word.)

L overpaid for this clothing (by late Sunday afternoon garage sale standards). Still, two of the three things are really nice: well made, quality fabric, funky patterns. The third, however, defies description. But I’ll try.

It is a corduroy zippered shirt/jacket. The color is between red and burgundy: very bright. There are two square pockets on the front and the sleeves have a cuff and button. The most notable thing for me, though, was that it was clearly marked as a women’s plus size. My son had bought something designed for the overweight 40+ demographic… It was so ugly that the original owner had never even worn it; the tags were still new with an extra button in a little bag.

Well, I cut the tags out so that L could enjoy his new jacket – he would ne’er have to notice the truth. Next we threw it in the wash with the other two items (everything had maroon in it for some reason… perhaps all owned by the same large woman??)

L. said that the “t-shirt” was ugly, and the proof --according to L-- was that the guy who was running the garage sale “laughed” when he saw L carrying it.   I'm thinking that maybe the guy was laughing because he saw L buying all of his wife's (or his mother’s) clothes????

   The irony is lovely. … but you would have had to be here in this past year to see the unfiltered disdain my son has expressed regarding all things MO  – MOM, OLD LADY –   my clothes,   my taste,   my humor,   my lack of edurance/physical fitness,   my attempts to get him to clean his room. (ok ok - I am exagerating a tad.)  

Poor L. The jacket had lay unused for too long. When I got it out of the dryer after just a few minutes, the back had ripped in parallel lines. L wanted to repair it – and he tried it on to show me why it was worth it. I was completely successful in supressing my laughter.  I said we’d try to repair it – but the fact that there are parallel tears in the corduroy means that any repair will probably just force the next weak spot to rip. Still, I would so love to see L wearing that jacket. Maybe “repair jacket” should be on my to do list for today.