The Red Jacket

Personally, I haven't worn it in several years. My expanding beer belly has made it quite snug and I fear that, once zipped up, I would split the zipper open, and I don't care to endure that sort of embarrassment.

Some time before the pandemic, we were clearing out old clothing and I placed my old Blackstone Gore-Tex rain shell on the pile to go to Value Village. DW balked, "You're not throwing that out!"

"It doesn't fit anymore."

My first rain shell, Peggy's Cove, 1996.

It was my second such shell and was, admittedly, a much-better quality than my previous one. I call it a shell because I rarely wore it without a fleece jacket or a sweater underneath this thin layer. Together, these coverings kept me warm and dry in any weather. From late fall to early spring, I wore this combination of outerwear for more than 20 years.

My best friend, Stuart, had once loaned a similar though heavier-duty shell to DW when we were travelling around the Philadelphia-Princeton-New York City corridor and afterward told her to keep it. She wore it for a few more years and to this day still hangs on a coat hanger in our basement closet.

A few years later, in 1996, when my first, lesser-quality shell started to fray and leak, DW and I headed to Trailhead to update our rain shells. I believe the decision to replace both jackets came as we were preparing to move to South Korea, and we wanted to have a light, reliable covering for rain and snow.

Red has been my favourite colour for as long as I can remember, and when we went to Trailhead to replace our outerwear, DW spoke up when I reached for the bright-red Blackstone shell.

"You know, I like red, too," she said.

"I thought blue was your favourite colour."

"It is," she said, "but blue doesn't define me. I like lots of colours."

"So, get a red one, too," I said. "I like the red coat and blue isn't a colour that looks particularly good on me." I think the other colour choices were grey, a navy blue, and black. I also liked the black shell but because we often wore these while hiking in the woods, I wanted a colour that would stand out.

"I'm not going to get the same colour as you," she said, "that just looks weird." She ended up buying the blue Blackstone.

We wore these jackets all over Korea.

In Seoul, with our long-time friend, Suze.

Pulling a ball from a dragon's mouth, at Haeinsa.

The guy who processed my film, in Chŏnju.

When we returned to Canada, in 1999, we continued to wear these jackets over the winter months and would pack them with our camping gear, for the days that brought rain.

As I said, time and aging has made it such that I can no longer wear the shell with any sort of breathing space. Over the years, I have also purchased a rain shell that folds into a small pack that can fit into my camera bag, and so it's now my shell of choice. I also have a couple of proper snow jackets, and the fleece-shell combination are no longer necessary.

I was going to give the Blackstone, which is still in excellent condition after 25 years, to charity. But DW has now snapped it up. I'm not the only one who has filled out over time, and her blue Blackstone fits her the way my red one fits me.

And so, this jacket lives on. DW finally has the colour that she's wanted all this time.