Flannel

You wanted to wear my dad’s shirt. You pulled it off the chair and dragged it across the floor and held it up to me. I draped it around your shoulders. You shuffled down the hall, wrapped in flannel. Green. 2XL. Made by a brand called RedHead, of all things, apparel for men, since 1856. I wear that shirt when I take Apricot out back late at night. I wear it when it’s cool in the morning and I’m making coffee. Sometimes it covers me when I take a nap in the recliner in the study. Most of the time it hangs in the closet or stays on the back of a chair for days and days. A green flannel shirt. It’s big on me, too. These are the ways we remember. This is how we try to make present in our lives what is past. We hold onto a thing. Your grandfather was wise and I miss his advice. Your grandfather was an adventurer and I miss his stories. Your grandfather was an animal doctor and I wish he could guide us with Apricot. Missing and wishing, wearing and watching you wear.

It is four in the morning. Full moon. My sleep is off. Air through the cracked open window. Cars in the distance. Always cars in the distance. Snoring dog at my feet. Tired and awake. Remembering. Gaming out. Remembering. I’m a boy, in the back seat of the car, driving home from the airport, it is night, AM radio on, we picked up my father, he is in the passenger seat, he is telling us the story of his trip, each day, from start to finish, the people he met, the mountain, how it was cold, how it was windy, how he camped and climbed, how he waited and waited, how he finally found what he was looking for. I’m a boy in the back seat. Headlights in the rear window. Cars passing. News radio. All the trips. All the mountains. All the stories. They blend and fade. Into the dark and the wind. All those years ago. It’s how the memory feels that keeps.

It is five in the morning. You are asleep again after being awake. The house is quiet. The shirt is downstairs, in the kitchen maybe, or someplace else.