A Closet Full of Love – By Carmelene Melanie Siani

One Christmas about 6 years ago, my youngest daughter gave me a workout outfit to wear to the gym as a Christmas present.

“It’s the kind you like mom,” she said, jokingly. “It doesn’t actually look like a workout outfit.”

She was right. I’d never really ever seen anybody else at the gym in green velveteen bell bottom pants with a matching hoody.

I still have that outfit and six years later, when I go to my closet to put on something to wear to the gym, I pull down those green velveteen bell bottoms that my daughter gave me and think of her.

In fact, there’s not a thing hanging in my closet that, if it was a gift, I can’t remember who gave it to me and for what occasion. The ruby colored skirt given to me by a friend when we were at a roadside tourist trap somewhere in Northern Arizona; the black satin bustier bought on an impulse when my new husband spotted it in the window of a swanky dress shop — even the bright 1970’s orange colored Gucci scarf that my first husband bought me 40 years ago when we were in Scottsdale for our anniversary…

…”It’s on sale honey! It’s “only” $100.00.”

I used to have a jacket my mother made for me. She called it a “coat of many colors.” It was a patchwork of different colored cloth hung with buttons and trinkets and ribbons throughout. It literally jangled when I wore it. For some reason — did I give it away? Did I lose it in moving? — I don’t have that jacket anymore. I’ve never forgotten it though, and still see its colorful ghost hanging in my closet.

What is it about clothes that people give you? You go to your closet and you put them on and you feel like you are wearing more than just green velveteen bell bottom pants or a red skirt or a hoodie.

You feel like you are wearing love.

And when you look in your closet, you don’t see a closet full of clothes, but a closet full of love.

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Author Bio: Carmelene Melanie Siani

Carmelene writes stories from every day life and how life itself offers lessons to help us grow, expand, and put our feet on higher ground.

https://www.facebook.co/StoryBelly/

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