OUT!!

There was a time in my life, believe it or not, where I had a wee bit of pride. There were just certain things I would not do. I would never wear a tuque. I would never carry an umbrella. Gloves and mittens were for women and soft handed men. Scarves got in the way and irritated more than warmed. Above all, I would never, ever, wear white socks with black shoes. I may have been fat my whole life but I did have a fashion 'no' or two. I'm not sure why these things were so important to me, but they were. It's amazing how things change.

Really change.

Yesterday was really cold. We had decided on going on an outing down to College Park mall. Joe kept saying, 'You're getting over a cold, you don't have a really warm jacket. What are we going to do to keep you warm. I don't have a tee shirt. I don't wear tee shirts. But I had determined I was going out, and I had determined I would be warm. Here's what I wore, two pair of socks covered by my white slippers knitted especially for me by wonder-knitter niece. They are warmer than my shoes. Who cares that I was wearing black jeans and my double socks were black. Apparently not I.

I then put on my sweater-jacket and sat on the chair. I pulled my dark blue blanket off the couch, folded it up and draped it over my back, shoulders and chest. I got a blue toque and pulled it down over my ears. I zipped up my sweater, right to the top so my collar stood up and thus wrapped around the lower third of my face. I then put on two heavy blue mittens. I was dressed to go.

Joe sent me ahead as he needed to get some bags to take with us for the grocery shopping. I rolled down to the elevators and as such drove by the huge floor to ceiling mirrors that hang across from the lifts. I looked, for all the world, like a laundry hamper come to life. I was blue upon blue, with two little green eyes peering out at the world. And there, flashing my arrival were my bright, white feet.

Thank heaven's we were out of the building quickly because I was beginning to swelter under there. On our way down the wind was bitter and the temperature frigid. Even through the layers I could feel various parts of my skin pucker and tremble in the cold. But I was out. I may not have been a 'man about town' as much as a blue clad Sherman Tank. And I didn't care. Not one whit.

We got into the mall and peeled off the layers, stuffing them into the bags that we had, I was looking back to normal, or so I thought until I caught my reflection in the mirror. There was my white, white face, with a strip of red, from flesh freezing, across my eyes. I looked like a horny raccoon.

The look oddly pleased me.