Winter Coat

Writing this, or attempting to write this, has been as difficult as it has for me to unpack my last suitcase from Boston. The suitcase has remained untouched, and is standing in the corner of the guest room since March - much to my mother’s dismay. She reminds me frequently of its mobile status, and each time I tell her that I would unpack it on the weekend. Well, I finally did this weekend. And if I was able to pull out my musty, stale parka along with some shawls, a few sweaters and the tube of concealer I had been looking for since April, I can finally write this post. It is a miracle I didn’t choke on the mounds of dust that had collected on all of the clothing, or from the stale, noxious odor that emanated from the parka.

Previously, I would always be forced to unpack a suitcase when the weather would change. In college, I would toss in the few summer clothes I would bring back into my suitcase to make room for the chunky sweaters, shawls, stockings and woolen skirts that would accommodate a New England winter. I kept my heavy parka zipped in a garment bag and hung in the corner of my closet until right around this time every year. Just shy of Thanksgiving. Seems appropriate that I pulled it out now as well. However, this year, it is going straight to the dry cleaner and then tightly packed in a storage box in my closet. It really has no place here in Singapore. That jacket has provided so much solace, comfort and yes, warmth, over the past four years. The weight of it itself envelopes you into a warm embrace, and it’s oddly comforting. Everyday, I would wear however many layers felt comfortable, shove my Uggs on, wrap one of the shawls my mom packed for me and finally shrug my coat on. And that would be the routine everyday from late November until early March. Not counting those El Nino fueled sporadic warm and sunny days in January. It was the heaviness of the coat, the pressure felt on my shoulders and the shear bulkiness that would give the satisfaction and confidence almost to walk out and brace the tundra that lay before me. Perhaps I’m being dramatic, but for someone who lived in Hong Kong, and never had experienced anything colder than 3˚C (40˚F), Bostonian winters were not easy to adjust to. With my jacket all zipped up, I would waddle - literally - out of the apartment, and be on my way.

Pulling the jacket out for the first time every season is always memorable. I’ll wear it over my pajamas and walk around the apartment, in awe of how heavy it is and bulky. I’ll stare in the mirror and comment on how unshapely it is. Someone - Elizabeth - will squeeze my arm to feel where my arm is under the chunkiness of the goose-down. I’ll struggle with the zip, and then immediately trip while walking because I can no longer see my feet while wearing the coat. This happened every year. It was the same jacket every time. But every year, without fail, this routine would ensue. But it was tradition.

And I miss that tradition. I just miss change, I suppose. The world came to a standstill in March, and while the status of the pandemic remains largely unchanged, everything else has changed for me. I have graduated from college, I have been working full-time for the past few months, and I have begun a whole new chapter of my life. And yet, some part of me is still in denial that anything has actually changed. I never realized how much importance I had placed on something as simple as pulling out a winter coat, but the lack of the necessity of having to adjust to changing weather, has me unable to process that so much time has already passed this year. The lack of seasons, and therefore the lack of change, makes it very difficult to register all the time that has passed. Days are more or less the same. Outfits are more or less the same. A t-shirt. Flip flops. That same summer dress. Those denim shorts. The monotony causes every day to blend together. Which is a shame, because every day is different in its own unique way. And yet, I have been unable to appreciate it because the repetition of routine oppresses anything that happens out of the ordinary. If anything, we should be trying to make each day as different as we can especially since the weather changing is so out of our control.

This year, for the first time, my parents and I won’t be in India visiting my family. Drinking whiskey with my grandparents at 11 in the morning, nibbling away at fruit cake, wearing two layers of jackets because central heating doesn’t exist in Indian houses are all characteristic of how we spend the holiday season. It’ll be incredibly easy for us to forgo this season entirely, especially as the weather will be the same giving no real reason to be festive, and because our Christmas traditions are unique to New Delhi winters with our family. I fear that we’ll get past the holiday season, and it’ll just become another day that blends into our year.

I’ve almost just taken each day for granted in that I go with the standard routine because I feel that I don’t have a reason for it to be changed. While I don’t have a change in weather to be the catalyst for my change of routine anymore, I have this post as a reminder that change is needed. Perhaps I delayed writing this because I prolonged having to recognize that. Just as I delayed unpacking the suitcase because I wasn’t ready to acknowledge I wouldn’t be wearing that jacket, and waddling down Commonwealth Avenue this winter. Change isn’t easy. But we need it because it helps us be more appreciative of what we have, it gives us something to look forward to, and it gets us out of the rut that we so comfortably fall into. Planning for an extravagant Christmas to be celebrated at home with the three of us might seem exaggerated, but I’m determined to make the last month of 2020 more different than what the months from March until now have been. The pandemic might be stagnant, but it is time for my life not to be.

This is a lot of expectation and hope to be placed on the white chocolate and cranberry cookies I plan on baking for Christmas but…for the first time all year, I’m going to be hopeful.