(no subject)

[xaara]

I found my coat.

You know, that black leather trench coat I've wanted for, like, a thousand years?

I walked into the thrift store today intent upon browsing the used poetry books section for some Whitman I'd never read and I saw this tiny sign that read "Leather Sale." So I figured, what the hell. I might as well take a look.

It was there. Buried under a bunch of other coats, some of them brown, some of them red, some with fur collars. There was a random sparkly dress, a series of knit scarves.

And there was my coat.

I stood there, mouth open, and just stared at it for a few minutes, afraid to try it on. I took it off the hangar and inspected it, sure there must be something wrong with it. Sure that the lining must be ripped, that there must be a bleach stain along one of the lapels, sure that there was a rip over one of the shoulders. The only problem: one missing generic black button.

I couldn't stand it. I walked away. I browsed the poetry section, picking up a copy of Sonnets from the Portuguese and a tiny pocket-sized paperback of some T. S. Eliot. I browsed through the appliances, the furniture, the shirts, the pants, the belts, the shoes, the music, the goddamn romance novels.

It felt like having a crush, you know, the kind where you can't look at the guy because you might give everything away with the flicker of an eyelid. Looking at the coat would mean that I loved it, and I wasn't ready to dedicate my life to it quite yet.

Then, I had a serious talk with myself that consisted of something like this:

Pro!Carmen: Dude. You've been looking for that coat for four years.
Scared!Carmen: But.... It's too perfect. Something must be wrong.
Pro!Carmen: The only thing that's wrong is your brain. It's your coat! You know it's yours!
Scared!Carmen: But I should think about it. That's a lot of money to spend on a--
Pro!Carmen: You're getting it at a thrift store! You're paying less than a quarter of the price you'd pay anywhere else! You earn twice that much in a week!
Scared!Carmen: But what if--
Pro!Carmen: You know what? Screw this. Walk away. Know for the rest of your life that you passed up your coat.
Scared!Carmen, pulling out debit card: Where's the damn checkout?

So now I have a black leather coat that will just brush the top of my medium-height boots, and will look so totally awesome in the winter and it swirls and swishes and slides and smells so nice and is obviously not new and so has a story and I love it love it love it love it.

I realize I sound like a crazy person. But my god. It's like...it's like nothing. It's my coat. It's my grail, it's my arc, it's my goddamn Atlantis.

It's mine.

Comments

[lady-of-winter.livejournal.com]

I'm happy for you. X3