This shirt has fucking pockets!

This shirt has fucking pockets!

This shirt has fucking pockets!

Yes! This fucking shirt!

The one I got last night at the fucking Von Maur’s in the fucking mall. Six dollars!

My six-dollar, originally 78, plaid, heavy twill shirt has pockets!

All it took was a mindless act. Just putting away my earbuds. Sometimes, it’s the simplest acts which unlock the most.

I was walking into Franklin Park Conservatory, the giant municipal biodome. My sister had gifted me a membership. I would’ve been happy enough with the admission and 10% off in the gift shop. But I had a new shirt that the gentleman at Von Maur’s assured me looked as good as a six dollar shirt can look on someone.

In the 19th century, public parks were designed with promenading in mind. It was thought that a nice walk while wearing an interesting hat that you could periodically doff to the ladies was the bestest form of societal uplift.

Since I look stupid in hats, I wore the shirt I got the previous day. I was like the cool kids in high school who would wear their Loverboy tees the day after the concert because… Loverboy is so fucking cool?

Could a simple shirt make someone “Loverboy cool?” Not in terms of the awful Canadian band, but in terms of the Billy Ocean jam?

On a normal day, I do “bear” pretty well as I can easily grow hair on weird parts of my body and have type 2 diabetes. Grrr. But with this fucking shirt AND wandering around a plant museum where I can make small talk about plants and not name/hometown/major… I fucking belong. My acceptance of this belonging makes me a fucking thirst trap. I might make even make eye contact with somebody. Woof!

I gathered my things for my trek thru the hothouse. Did the spectacles/testicles/wallet/watch motion to make sure I had everything. Went back to the car to get the earbuds because you never know what’s going to be overrun with screaming infants.

But I had a good feeling I wasn’t gonna need them. Still. I rolled them up in a futile gesture toward making them easier to untangle later. My muscle memory went to put them into where the pocket on my green hoodie would have been had I not been dressed for promenading.

In a pre-shirt world, my left hand would have just continued down. My body would have followed, and I would fall flat on my face. In front of the plants.

The earbuds went into a pocket where there shouldn’t have been a pocket. They just stayed there, suspended only by a heavy twill plaid. I felt a lightness that comes with finding a place for your stuff. The sun brightened like I assume it did at Fatima. I could feel more warmth. I pulled my hand out and put it back in. Still, the pocket stayed. I had not had an “episode” like that time I imagined I was hearing “To Sir With Love” everywhere I went. This was real. My shirt had fucking pockets.

I looked around to see if this was a trick. Bullies will do that. Get you all joyed up. Then comes the pig’s blood. Even without pockets, this shirt does not deserve pig’s blood. But with the pockets, this shirt now gives me the power to lock all the doors and burn down this biodome if anyone tries to cross me. With my mind.

I was alone in the parking lot. A couple was getting out of sedan farther down my row. It was just me and the bright, bright winter sun. I felt it necessary to put both hands in their pockets, spin around three time, pull my hands out, then tussle my hair like Marlo Thomas in the opening of That Girl.

Goddam, I feel like a young career gal in the big city in this shirt with the awesome pockets. I can take on the world AND get free admission to the arboretum.

I can put things in places you can only dream of.

Luxuriate in my heavy twill musk, Central Ohio!

I strode over the couple and made eye contact with a gentleman who obviously understood the practicalities of fashion. He was wearing a dyed wool overcoat with a “7” in a 1970s Rhoda font. And because gurl was looking at plants, hiking boots with what seemed to be Cuban heels. I was in that ten-foot range where you have to say something if you make eye contact.

BTW… I NOW HAVE THE POWER OF EYE CONTACT!

“Morning!” he nodded.

“I got this shirt at the Von Maur’s yesterday in the mall. Six dollars! And…” I vigorously thrust my hands into my new pockets repeatedly, grinning broadly. “…it has pockets!”

“That’s… nice.” He looked over to his companion, a just-conspicuously-enough younger Brazilian-ish man whose tips were the same contrast ratio as the three-inch houndstooth pattern on his puffy down vest.

“You’re damn right it’s nice!” I chirped at the Houndstooth Brazilian.

Then I turned on my heels like they taught me in tai-chi and strode towards the biodome’s entrance. You know they were both looking at my ass. How could you not? The confidence that comes with pockets makes every ass amazing. You don’t have to carry shit, so baby can make those blue jeans talk.

I made one more wide arc twirl on my way in. I paused. Took in my surroundings like a lion on the veldt. The employee at the counter and I locked eyes. She nodded, and I approached.

In one elegant hand ballet, I took out my wallet and the temporary membership card.

“I have this.” I handed her the card.

“Nice.” She inspected it and handed it back to me. I put it back in the wallet. Then, making sure she saw, I put the wallet into one of my new pockets. “Ooooo, pockets,” she cooed.

Knowing I had to cut this sexual tension for the sake of the children present, I asked what benefits came with the membership.

She listed them. When she got to the part about “reciprocal benefits,” a surge of energy hit me. I thrust my hands deeply into my pockets, and bounced up and down. She snorted a tiny laugh, just enough that her modified bob moved a little.

I stopped, took in a breath, and smiled. “Sorry.” But I wasn’t sorry. It was just my “sorry” tic.

“Not sorry.” I raised my eyebrows like I knew the heist would be successful.

“I know,” she said. “I bounce when I’m happy, too.”

…

OH FUCK… I’m happy?!?