Shokufeh is... home

Turtlenecks

It's somewhat arbitrary, the things that I have now that were part of my life before the storm. Maybe arbitrary is not quite the right word since, in general, if it was downstairs it was ruined by the seven feet of water that resulted from the levee breaks and if it was upstairs (or with me in Honolulu) it was untouched. But what was upstairs and what was downstairs was not cleanly divided by how much the things meant to me or when in my life I'd acquired or used them. Two of the things I most regret losing are:
1) it's materialistic, but... my boots. They were dark brown leather knee-high square-toed boots that I bought in the winter of 2001-02, when I was living in Chicago. I looked for these boots forever: most of what I came across was too big in the calf and/or too pointy in the toe. These were perfect, even more so because I got them for an awesome price at DSW and then paid a pittance to have the tops cut down to fit my height. It didn't make sense to take them to Honolulu, so I settled for wearing them when I visited New Orleans in cooler weather.
2) something more sentimental, something I've long loved but that I didn't realize I was so attached to until it hit me it was gone... an acrylic cube with a dandelion inside. Interesting looking, but it's more the idea behind it that I miss - when I graduated from college, someone I'd worked with throughout college gave it to me, along with a note saying that it had been a gift from her husband many years before. And that the reason she was giving it to me (and the reason he'd given it to her) was because of my likeness to a dandelion: delicate but strong. That note, and talking about that note, has always made me teary.

There's a part of me that hopes that the cube is upstairs, safe and sound, but I don't really think so. There are other things, like photos from China and the Gambia that I'm afraid to look for, because I don't want to discover that they were downstairs. Soon I will have the courage.

So, this was supposed to be about turtlenecks, but I have yet to mention them. As the weather has grown colder here, I've been more thankful for some of the stuff that survived the storm, such as turtlenecks. Ones that I'd left behind. Downstairs. Before we left Chicago and headed to Honolulu, I bagged and boxed my clothes that I would be storing in my parent's basement. Strangely, one of those bags floated, upright, and the contents stayed dry. I wish it could have been a bag with the boots and the dandelion cube, but then maybe I would have mourned the loss of my turtlenecks. Heck, who am I kidding? But at least in addition to my few pairs of my pants, I have a selection of cold-weather tops to wear with them.