Sweet Potato Haircut

My coat is an XL, and on my M frame it bulks my shoulders and arms, making my middle a question mark of mush and wool and rubber. It hangs nearly to my knees and keeps me wonderfully, luxuriously warm.

My coat is a bright, sunshine yellow and makes me a moving billboard of lightness and joy. I get many a look as I cross the sidewalks and the small lawns, and instead of interpreting them I smile and hope my colors have brought something good into the world. 

My coat came to me in the nick of time, after my dog Ollie’s leash tore the pocket of my old coat apart as he took off after his brother and my hand, holding the leash, once hiding in my pocket from the cold, was swept from the warmth of my coat’s insides and then there ceased to be insides, or at least a pocket, as the leash pulled it instantaneously apart from the power of my blissful wilderness puppy.

My dad spotted the coat from across the store, outdoorsy and empty on a cold night, and brought it over for my speculation, beaming. He said that this coat was one for the elements, hardcore and durable. It shone brightly in the artificial light and I pulled it on, feeling not only the warmth of the faux fur but of my dad’s love, invested in my continual warmth and wellbeing as I make my way through the world.

My coat is infused with love.

My coat lets me lay in the winter woods, keeping me dry and warm, insulated from the cold earth beneath my back as I watch the baying branches above, vulnerable and raw to the clouded day. I imagine myself sinking into the dirt, dissolving in the mysterious way of decay, the inevitable and compelling return to the truest home of earth and roots. I am nutrient matter, nourishment, life energy. 

My coat hangs on the back of my door and I watch it, assured of the next yellow clad adventure, of the love that exists in the world for me, of the visceral joys of being held, of being warmed and safely weathered by this wild and wondrous life.