Tom Lynch

I'm always cold. Fall winter spring summer. Given my peculiar relationship with layers, people buy me sweaters all the time, like for my birthday. In June.

I have a special relationship with each of my sweaters. But my new Christmas cardigan isn't getting along with the others in my collection. It's quiet yet hideous, a disgusting green that vaguely resembles puke. My blue-and gray-striped Croft and Barrow won't accept it into the clique in my bottom two drawers.

The red and green Freddy Krueger wool--stagnant since October--is itching to see daylight. It's more like Halloween attire. It won't like January, I can tell.

I have a dark gray V-neck that I bought about seven years ago at a thrift store. It was free with the purchase of another sweater. I forget what the other one looked like-- it's long gone--but my gray beauty has white spots laced across the front, like diamonds. Now that I think about it, it might be a woman's sweater. No wonder high school sucked.

My blue and gray stripe is the leader, the Patton. Krueger is up there, but he's dangerously close to retirement. My diamond-laced hate-target is the grandfather. I also have two navy blues, another dark gray, a black that I never liked but keep around for emergencies, and a brown cardigan. My Christmas vomit card and my brown cotton are the new kids on the block. A hazing period is in progress. They will be worn in the most extreme situations, like visits to bars and tackle football games. If they live, they're in.

(2004-01-06)

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