I Am Gonna Stand My Ground.

voltee ♦ January 28, 2011 ♦ 3 Comments

Item: Jacket Color/Fabric: Blackish, pleather Designer: Wet Seal Where Purchased: A gift from my sister Years Owned: ??? Possibly over ten?

Well, tonight I have for you an oldie for sure. I can’t remember when I got this jacket, as a very thoughtful gift from my wonderful sister. But I feel like I had this, quite possibly during college. Which would make it very old, indeed.
I’m not sure.
I am sure, though, that I have loved this dearly. It’s just quirky enough to be super cool, and it is a blessing in a rainstorm. It kind of feels like it’s made out of rubber, the pleather is so thick.
However, I think it’s been a while since I’ve worn this.
The only occasion where I can 100% remember wearing this is when I went to see my friend Erica at Kenyon College. I don’t recall the occasion. I think that it may have been a sort of Cross Country Championship, and I went to cheer her on.
Wait. That was the first time I went to Kenyon. That was during our freshman year of college, and it was a sad trip. It was the first time that I remember feeling all of my high school friends becoming adults, and discovering new lives, new paths, and new facets of themselves that had not yet seen the light of day. A tumultuous time. Not a bad time, necessarily, but not an easy time, either. But it’s just hard to understand, and hard to accept. I guess it would be what one calls “Growing pains.” I sure felt the pang. I shed many tears after that trip.
This second trip, though, when I wore the jacket, I no longer remember why it happened
Maybe I just wanted to spend time with my friend.
I do remember that there was some sort of costume party that wasn’t Halloween, and I was given a strange gown to wear that I loved so much I slept in it.
I sort of feel like I made that up. Or maybe dreamed it.
There is another memory of the gown, though, and being smushed in a pickup truck with all three of us in the front seat.
Being happy.
And I wore this jacket, and I remember Erica’s then boyfriend, now husband saying that it was the coolest leather jacket he’d ever seen.
“It’s not leather,”I told him. “It’s pleather.”
“Kerry, you shouldn’t tell people that. I would have thought it was leather,” he chastised me.
I always get chastised by men for saying things like that. I have a hard time with compliments, I guess. Usually if someone tells me that they like something I’m wearing, I’ll say, “Thanks. It only cost $1.”
I remember that habit made my friend Andy disgusted. “Stop saying things like that! Women do that all the time, and it’s degrading. Just say, ‘Thank You’ and smile, and let me believe that it cost hundreds of dollars.”
I’m still struggling with this concept. Obviously.
Anyway. Erica and Ian and I went to a party, where I did my usual amount of spastic joyous dancing, most of the time with a really fun girl who I didn’t know.
I thought that we were enjoying music and celebrating life.
And I was completely oblivious to the fact that she was looking for something more until she tried to kiss me when we went outside to cool off.
“Oh!” I said, utterly surprised. “I’m engaged, I’m sorry.”
I didn’t know what else to say. So I just went back inside and danced.
Which seems to be a technique I’ve used many times in my life…
I wish I could remember more of that weekend, but it’s left me.
And I can’t decide how I feel about the jacket. I do still think it’s really cool. But maybe the black has come off too much at this point, maybe it’s passed the ‘good beat up’ point and entered the ‘ bad run down’ point’. What say you?

**I have loved this so, but it’s time to part. There’s a lot left to love, though, if someone wants to try!