pry it open with your love

kamila came to visit once. and she brought me this scarf as a gift. and the scarf was beautiful - it's from london. it's silk. it's white with red and yellow. she wrapped it in paper that she had handmade.

i could never really wear the scarf. every time i put it on, it looked stupid. too old. or too nice. or too pretty. or too rich. or something. and so i tucked it away in the bottom of my desk drawer, and mostly forgot about it for about a year. sometimes i'd open the drawer and put it on, look at myself in the window reflection - and decide that it wasn't right and stuff it back in the drawer again.

i remember being in brooklyn, and this guy coming up to me and laurie at the bar and he told us our scarves were "superfluous." and granted, they were. i told him, "no. you are." i didn't actually tell him that, but i wish that i would have. i told him, though, that his flannel shirt was also superfluous. he pointed out that it was plaid. actually - i'm mixing stories.

because that was another time.

after i came back from mexico, laurie and i went to pollocks to get a beer. i was getting dressed, and i decided to try the scarf kamila had given me again. and i looked in my window reflection, and i looked awesome. and i felt like a woman in it. we spent the night with two guys who had just gotten out of jail. we played arethra franklin and otis redding the whole night on the juke box. they bought us every song. and all of our drinks. and we're walking home, and i'm feeling good. like - happy. and beautiful. and like i've got this secret that i try to keep, but it's written all over myself face. i can tell that people can see it, too - usually they just say something about the haircut - but it's more than that. it's more like magic. it's what a woman is like when she feels like a woman.

and so we're walking past this house on main street, and these boys inside of the house look out of the window and say, "you guys must be hipsters because you're wearing scarfs." and i said, "well you must be a hipster because you're wearing flannel." and he said, "it's not flannel, it's plaid."