i hate big warm blankets, too

i own one coat. i always forget it. all along the drive i think about what's missing, and because the habit hasn't set in, i don't know what it is.

i remember it because i'm remembering a tiny rose vial i found in a burnt out barrel near the train tracks where i grew up. i remember because when i brush the ashes off, the glass is still warm and smells like cedar.

it frustrates me because now i've got no coat, and i know for a fact that when i get home i'm going to turn through every box in the garage looking for that goddamned vial, thinking that there is some purpose there, but knowing, more than anything else, that the bottle isn't anywhere in the house.

all these choices, such beautiful choices.

i'm only out of the car for a few moments and the weather has turned balmy, decidedly uncoatlike, and still it's like i wore it with no shirt, and the wool is chafing my neck like an unfortunate incident. i hate coats. god, i hate them.

in third grade, mrs. armstrong called westley up to the front of the class. she told him to take his coat off. he said no. she forcefully unzipped it, right there in front of us all, 7 and 8 year olds alike. he didn't have a shirt because he was train track poor. she said he had to go home and he cussed at her, and in those days the classes had water fountains and bars of soap built right into the architecture, they did. that they did. god bless em, one and all. i think that little kid probably spent a lot of his dreams running through molasses.

i run hot and cold, most days.