Pulled Threads on My Sweater

It’s funny how memories get catapulted out of our minds. A smell floats through the air, let’s say banana. As soon as it hits your nostrils, you are taken back to that time you made banana bread at your friend's house when you were ten. Yes, his mom helped, but the kids did most of the work, and created most of the mess. Another memory that often comes back is from a coffee shop that employed me in high school. They sold pastries, sandwiches, and all kinds of delectable treats. So now, every time I smell that right combination of coffee and powdered sugar, I get mentally swept back to being seventeen.

Music also has this effect. The right song comes on the radio, and I’m wherever I was the first time I heard it. Foreigner, that is Lego building music. I can’t hear it now without wanting to sit on the floor and snap pieces together. If Phil Collins floats into my ear, I think about lying on the couch in the evening, watching my dad play along with his bass. Any slow song from the late 90s brings me right back to high school dances.

I recently had one of those memory rushes, but from an unexpected source. I got a sweater out of the closet and noticed that many of the threads around the left shoulder were stretched and pulled. In a millisecond, I was taken back to a few years earlier, when my family saw the Frozen play at the Paramount in Seattle. It was around Christmas time, and the grandkids were all at that age where Frozen was a big thing. So we piled into the theater and watched an amazing show.

The thing was, before they could get to the first big number, my daughter became restless. She climbed into my lap, then became a pile of mush. Unable to hold herself in any upright position, she was floundering. At first I was annoyed, until it started to register that she wasn’t feeling well. Cue some self-evaluation, and I realized I wasn’t feeling that well either. We were both getting sick, and it was coming on fast.

Luckily this wasn’t one of those colds that caused us to run out of the theater. It was the kind that turned us into immovable blobs. So we watched the play, slowly melting into our seats. I held it together better than my daughter. Years of practice and the desire to remain somewhat mature in front of my family dictated that I be strong. But my daughter, she wasn’t under any compulsion to show anything other than her actual feelings.

I’ll give it to her, she didn’t complain that much. What she did was oscillate between a sweaty pile of bricks and a slimy slug trying desperately to slide off my lap onto the floor. This back and forth did a number on my sweater. She was clinging so tight that whenever she switched to the limp noodle phase, she pulled at my sweater like crazy. When we stepped out of the theater and into the light, I could see that this particular garment was beaten up.

I used to like my sweater. Now I love it. Yes, it looks worse for wear, but I remember that play, and those hours of holding my daughter close. It may have been uncomfortable, but it was also a special moment. Parenting is more than just teaching your kid to be a normal part of society; it’s about holding them when they don’t feel good.

It won’t always be this way. In the years to come she will find her independence, and need my snuggles less and less. That’s okay. That’s life.

I have my little reminders in places like the closet.