Sean's Sweatshirt



Acts 9:39

 And Peter arose and went with them. And when he was come, they brought him into the upper chamber: and all the widows stood by him weeping, and showing the coats and garments which Dorcas made, while she was with them.

 For some reason, I love this verse of the Bible almost more than all others. It just strikes the chord of reality.  

 Intriguing it is when a garment or piece of material becomes symbolic of something great and beautiful. In the verse above, Dorcas/Tabitha (not sure why she had two names, maybe I should look it up) had died. She was a woman of good works, and when she passed, the widows that she had made coats and garments for brought them as a remembrance of her charity. God brings her back to life through Peter's prayers. God dried the widows' tears but let them cry and experience real loss first. 

 My buddy Sean left his sweatshirt and my house Saturday a week ago. I may have it for awhile. We were going to have him pick it up that Saturday but a nap intervened on his end and it is about 90 degrees plus every day since. More loincloth weather these days. 

 I don't wish to drop it off because he lives next to my previous house and the attendant not so positive memories there are still not entirely in the past. So, he's going to have to come to my 'hood and pick it up sometimes. 

 Sean was a great comfort through some hard and harsh times. We have an irregular regular meeting on Saturdays every so often to chat and talk about God and Jimi Hendrix and whatever else comes to mind. We share a lot of common history in that we were neighbor's for nearly a decade and we were both raised nominally Catholic (just enough to get the guilt deep in our bones).

 I used to make Sean some of my high-test coffee but he fragged out. Now, I keep caffeine free coffee grounds in the beer fridge. Lord knows that I won't drink it ever. Decaf coffee to me is like drinking alcohol-free beer. Why bother?  

 One great thing about really hard times is one sees who his friends really are. It is easy to be a buddy when it is all sunshine and rainbows. Not so much when a shit storm. Sean stuck with me through some dark days.

 So, even though initially I wanted to get the sweatshirt back to him asap because it was creating a lack of closure on my part (I have a need for completion) I am starting to like seeing his sweatshirt draped over my rocking chair. It reminds me of him.  

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