Legacy Writing 365:106

Eighth grade. Standing by my mother’s Chevy Malibu before school. The dress I’m wearing is one she made and I loved it–white yoke with long white sleeves; navy A-line with white polka dots.

My father is in Korea. My brother is in Okinawa. My sister is getting married and moving out. Everything is in flux, including the girl in the yellow raincoat.

Have you ever laughed when a child of, say, seven years, says something like, “When I was a little kid…” We forget that even as children, we had an awareness that we would never experience the world as that child again. The seven year old looks wistfully at three. The fourteen year old looks wistfully at seven. “Live in the moment!” we are urged. But I believe that all of our moments and who we were in them stay within us, even when we don’t remember them or we remember them through the lens of adult perceptions. We aren’t looking back; we’re looking in.

In “Yellow Raincoat,” Tim Hanauer sings:

If I only had my yellow raincoat
I’d take a walk in the pouring rain
and I’d look up at the sky
watch the clouds roll by
worries wash away playing in the rain

If I only had my yellow raincoat
I’d sit and watch cartoons, Sunday afternoons
I’d build a blanket fort, put off my book report
watching Sesame Street
pajamas with slipper feet

If I only had my yellow raincoat
I would dance around in the pouring rain
and I’d make ice cream on my bike
any flavor I would like
worries wash away playing in the rain

In the rain…

If I only had my yellow raincoat
I’d ride around on my big wheel
and I’d pretend that I could fly, soar across the sky
always love to play with big wheels in the rain

In the rain…

But it’s getting cold now, it’s raining hard now
too old to play in the pouring rain now
I don’t have my yellow raincoat
and I don’t want to
get wet anymore