From Chicken Soup for the Christian Soul
The baggy yellow shirt had long sleeves, four extra-
large pockets trimmed in black thread and snaps up the
front. It was faded from years of wear, but still in
decent shape. I found it in 1963 when I was home from
college on Christmas break, rummaging through bags of
clothes Mom intended to give away.
"You're not taking that old thing, are you?" Mom said
when she saw me packing the yellow shirt. "I wore that
when I was pregnant with your brother in 1954!"
"It's just the thing to wear over my clothes during art
class, Mom. Thanks!"
I slipped it into my suitcase before she could object.
The yellow shirt became a part of my college wardrobe.
I loved it. After graduation, I wore the shirt the day
I moved into my new apartment and on Saturday mornings
when I cleaned.
The next year, I married. When I became pregnant, I
wore the yellow shirt during big-belly days. I missed
Mom and the rest of my family, since we were in
Colorado and they were in Illinois. But that shirt
helped. I smiled, remembering that Mother had worn it
when she was pregnant, 15 years earlier.
That Christmas, mindful of the warm feelings the shirt
had given me, I patched one elbow, wrapped it in
holiday paper and sent it to Mom. When Mom wrote to
thank me for her "real" gifts, she said the yellow
shirt was lovely. She never mentioned it again. The
next year, my husband, daughter and I stopped at Mom
and Dad's to pick up some furniture. Days later, when
we uncrated the kitchen table, I noticed something
yellow taped to its bottom. The shirt! And so the
pattern was set.
On our next visit home, I secretly placed the shirt
under Mom and Dad's mattress. I don't know how long it
took for her to find it, but almost two years passed
before I discovered in under the base of our living-
room floor lamp. The yellow shirt was just what I
needed now while refinishing furniture. The walnut
stains added character.
In 1975 my husband and I divorced. With my three
children, I prepared to move back to Illinois. As I
packed, a deep depression overtook me. I wondered if I
could make it on my own. I wondered if I would find a
job. I paged through the Bible, looking for comfort.
In Ephesians, I read, "Put on the whole armor of God,
that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the
devil."
I tried to picture myself wearing God's armor, but all
I saw was the stained yellow shirt. Slowly, it dawned
on me. Wasn't my mother's love a piece of God's armor?
My courage was renewed.
Unpacking in our new home, I knew I had to get the
shirt back to Mother. The next time I visited her, I
tucked it in her bottom dresser drawer. Meanwhile, I
found a good job at a radio station. A year later I
discovered the yellow shirt hidden in a ragbag in my
cleaning closet. Something new had been added.
Embroidered in bright green across the breast pocket
were the words "I BELONG TO PAT."
Not to be outdone, I got out my own embroidery
materials and added an apostrophe and seven more
letters. Now the shirt proudly proclaimed, "I BELONG TO
PAT'S MOTHER." But I didn't stop there. I zig zagged
all the frayed seams, and then had a friend mail the
shirt in a fancy box to Mom from Arlington, VA. We
enclosed an official-looking letter from "The Institute
for the Destitute," announcing that she was the
recipient of an award for good deeds.
I would have given anything to see Mom's face when she
opened the box. But, of course, she never mentioned
it. Two years later, in 1978, I remarried. The day of
our wedding, Harold and I put our car in a friend's
garage to avoid practical jokers. After the wedding,
while my husband drove us to our honeymoon suite, I
reached for a pillow in the car to rest my head. It
felt lumpy I unzipped the case and found, wrapped in
wedding paper, the yellow shirt. Inside a pocket was a
note: "Read John 14:27-29. I love you both, Mother."
That night I paged through the Bible in a hotel room
and found the verses: "Peace I leave with you, my
peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I
unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let
it be afraid. Ye have heard how I said unto you, I go
away, and come again unto you. If ye loved me, ye
would rejoice, because I said, I go unto the Father:
for my Father is greater than I. And now I have told
you before it come to pass, that, when it is come to
pass, ye might believe."
The shirt was Mother's final gift. She had known for
three months that she had terminal Lou Gehrig's
disease. Mother died the following year at age 57. I
was tempted to send the yellow shirt with her to her
grave. But I'm glad I didn't, because it is a vivid
reminder of the love-filled game she and I played for
16 years. Besides, my older daughter is in college now,
majoring in art. And every art student needs a baggy
yellow shirt with big pockets.