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{"id":76108,"date":"2024-03-10T09:34:36","date_gmt":"2024-03-10T13:34:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.timcottonwrites.com\/?p=76108"},"modified":"2024-03-10T17:09:38","modified_gmt":"2024-03-10T21:09:38","slug":"the-qualities-of-the-drape","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.timcottonwrites.com\/2024\/03\/10\/the-qualities-of-the-drape\/","title":{"rendered":"The Qualities of the Drape"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I picked out three shirts that belonged to my old man. I took them from the closet with permission from my mom, who had taken an out-of-town break after Dad passed away. Some of his shirts fit me well, some not so much.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As expected, I went through the pockets\u2014his pockets. He might have left me a few bucks for a coffee, which would have tasted pretty good right about then. He didn’t, but I could picture him smiling because he would have done the same thing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>
\n

Art, my Old Man, at my sister’s wedding<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

I unwrapped the lone <\/a>Hall’s cough drop from the left shirt pocket of his long-sleeved heather green houndstooth flannel and let it dissolve in my mouth on the way home in the truck. It’s a dressy flannel, and I don’t have any.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mine are plaids, usually blocky, always the same as all the other guys who wear the same brand as me. Men don’t care if we buy the same shirt as another guy. You might even glance over and give them a subtle nod at the pub or the hardware store, noting that it most likely was purchased during the end-of-winter sale before Carhartt released the new patterns. “Ah, another value shopper. Good for you.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Flannels are not one-off prom dresses; they’re shirts meant to be removed and tossed over the hood of the pickup if the sun gets too warm when you help your neighbor load an old couch or put down on the ground to protect your old knees from pebbles when you get under the truck to find out what’s rattling at fifty-one miles per hour, but only when you let off the gas pedal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dad found some shirt sleeves too long for him, but I found them just about right for me. However, I kept them rolled up because he did. It’s one thing to skim him for coffee; it’s another to defile the qualities of the drape\u2014at least for now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My mom called me the other day to see if I wanted more shirts. I told her I’d picked out three, and that was all I could handle. I can’t tell you why that is. I don’t know. There’s a lot I don’t know.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I know it’s okay to call him my Old Man in this missive because he was. It wouldn’t have been an option when I was fifteen. That would have invited minor violence, deserved violence, I say. His shirts would have been too big then, anyway.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As life progressed, he used the term with me in phone messages, usually if I was three minutes late to pick him up for our breakfasts out on the town.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Hey, Tim. This is the Old Man. Did you say eight-thirty?” His passive aggressiveness was some of the kindest I have ever had to put up with. It was indeed a question, not a judgment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I’d listen to those messages after breakfast on my way home from dropping him off and laugh to myself. “I was only three minutes late,” I’d mumble.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I mostly keep my ringer off, so I missed the calls, and he’d never mention that he had called me just before I pulled in to pick him up. He had little patience for tardiness. Eight-thirty to my Old Man meant eight-fifteen sharp.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I wore the one with a faux fleece lining the other day when it was cold enough. It had handwarmer pockets, and I have to admit they were pretty handy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I rechecked the pockets as if he might have slipped me a couple of bucks for coffee. It wasn’t there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Instead, I found a pristine wad of folded Kleenex. He knew what I needed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From the Jagged Edge of America, I remain,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

TC<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n

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I picked out three shirts that belonged to my old man. I took them from the closet with permission from my mom, who had taken an out-of-town break after Dad passed away. Some of his shirts fit me well, some not so much. As expected, I went through the pockets\u2014his pockets. He might have left…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pgc_meta":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17,19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-76108","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog-posts","category-home-posts"],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.timcottonwrites.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76108","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.timcottonwrites.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.timcottonwrites.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.timcottonwrites.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.timcottonwrites.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=76108"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.timcottonwrites.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76108\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.timcottonwrites.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=76108"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.timcottonwrites.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=76108"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.timcottonwrites.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=76108"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}