A few years ago, in search of a rain suit, I considered two, one with slits in the rain pants' pockets that could provide access to the pockets in one's regular pants, and one suit without the slits. I chose the latter because it cost twenty dollars less. But ever after, I criticized myself for being so cheap. The rain jacket's pockets were hard to open and close, so I kept my wallet and keys in the pockets of my regular pants. In order to reach them, I’d have to pull open the waist of the rain pants and reach into the pocket of my regular pants. Wouldn’t it be grand to reach my wallet and keys through a slit in my rain pants! I looked forward to the arrival of the clothes that I had sent from Jerusalem, including rain pants with slits, which had been slumbering in a Bronx warehouse for the past three years.
The clothes arrived along with the rain suit. I gave away my old rain suit and began wearing the one from Jerusalem. It was raining heavily on Tuesday, so I wore it when my wife and I went out shopping. Our first stop was at the corner grocery, a small convenience store that carries the peanut butter that my brother likes. I paid for it with a credit card, which I put back in my wallet after the transaction and then placed the wallet in my pocket. On to the next destination!
After a few steps outside, I realized that I did not feel my wallet against my thigh. It was raining too hard to search for my wallet on the spot, so we retreated to the store, where I emptied my pockets and turned my backpack inside out, without finding my wallet. I asked the proprietor’s son, who had sold us the peanut butter, if he had seen my wallet. “Yes,” he said, “I saw you put it into your pants pocket.”
Oh boy, the wallet was somehow gone, evaporated. “Never mind the cash inside,” I moaned to myself, as I thought of the trouble I’d have of canceling credit cards and my Metro card and returning to the time-gobbling Department of Motor Vehicles to obtain a new identification card. My mood was made even worse because it was the poisonous hour before dinner, that time of day when life tends to seem bleak. Just then, one of the store’s workers pointed to a bulge at my ankle. And there was my wallet. Earlier, when I had put the wallet through the slit in my rain pants, the wallet fell not into the pocket of my regular pants but outside those pants. Fortunately the rain pants on that leg had been snapped shut at the ankle, keeping out the rain but also preventing my wallet from falling onto the floor. .
Greatly relieved, my wife and I left the store and proceeded to complete our other errands. When we returned home, I couldn’t find my house keys. After a thorough search of my backpack and pockets, I concluded that the keys had also fallen through my rain pants, but since the rain pants had not been snapped shut on the leg that held the keys, they fell onto the ground.
I’ve learned a valuable lesson. Never put your wallet or keys through the slits in your rain pants. Instead, put them in the pocket of your rain jacket (my Jerusalem rain jacket has easily accessible pockets). Had I been wearing my old rain suit, I would not have lost my keys nor would I have almost lost my wallet. You have to be careful what you wish for.
2010-2011 Anchises-An Old Man's Journal All Rights Reserved
In summer I put my keys in the front pocket of my stratch jeans. They are in a case, they can not fall out nor make a hole in the pocket. In May by the time I came back from my commercialists, 100 metres, they disappeared. The poket was not broken. Someone took them out? Who Knows? All my friends who had copies were away. Luckily I found a neighbour to open the outside door, luckily the shop was open, luckily I signed the number of the security keys in my papers(the original card was inside), luckily the shop knew me and accepted to make a copy. If it happened in August I had to go to Como. Wally
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