Full Circle

In honor of Earth Day, I have a funny story. We'll go back to Mrs. X's callow youth when she attended her first (and last) outdoor Earth Day concert. I don't remember much about the concert itself. I went with my best friend and her boyfriend. It was at a well-known ampitheatre several miles away from home and had an indoor and outdoor section. We being cheap high school students got tickets for the lawn.

As it was Earth Day, it was in April and either it had already rained or it was predicted to rain. Back then, of course, a little rain really wasn't going to make much difference. So, we went to the concert and the only act I remember is Midnight Oil, complete with the crazy lead singer with his bald head.

Being the prepared little Miss X that I was, I grabbed a blanket for us on the way out to the concert. We would need something to sit on, after all. I grabbed the drab olive green blanket and headed out the door. As usually happens, rain mixed with dirt = mud. Most of the mud ended up on the blanket, which was precisely what I had intended.

Miss X arrived home after the concert with said muddy blanket and her mother had herself a F-I-T. Now, if you were to ever meet my mother you would be immediately impressed by how calm and easy going she is. So, when she gets riled about something, she gets pissed off. What I didn't know at the time was that the drab olive green blanket that I had chosen had not been purchased somewhere. Oh no. Mom knitted the blanket after my parents were married but before I graced (or cursed) their lives. It was made out of 100% wool that was hand carried by her friend all the way from Ireland just for her. It was also enormous and extremely intricate. She obviously worked very hard on it. So, of course she'd be pissed that her callow, thoughtless daughter would take it to an Earth Day concert and get it thoroughly, disgustingly muddy. I would be.

In the end, all was forgiven because she was able to wash the blanket and it came out perfectly. At the time, I didn't realize how stupid I had been to take that particular blanket or how lucky I was that it was salvageable.

Fast forward about 18 years. I got an e-mail from my mother a few weeks ago asking me if I remembered the green blanket. Of course, I replied. That was the one I took to the Earth Day concert and got all muddy. My mother replied, that's the one. She asked if I was interested in becoming the new owner of the blanket or else.... she was going to sell it on ebay. Now I found this so incredibly ironic. The blanket that brought me this close to corporeal punishment, that I was castigated for getting dirty was now going to be sold on eBay?!

I mentioned this to her and she then got riled all over again with the memory of what I had done. Several discussions on the phone with both my mom and my dad ensued each giving their memory of the particular incident (neither one painted me in a particularly sympathetic light). In the end, though, she was forced to admit that, yes, it was rather ironic that the blanket in question was now going to be auctioned off to the highest bidder.

Well, I decided that given its history, particularly with me, I decided that I would give it a new home. It's now sitting on the futon here in my office, where it will probably be adopted by a furry animal and turn from green to grey. At least it won't be getting muddy again.
image: TalkingTree