Coming out of the closet

I was cleaning out my wardrobe last night (a rare event in itself) and came across a "new" jacket. The past came back to me....

We had put up the little Christmas tree, my brothers and I. Having traded down from the 6-foot tree to a little 3.5-footer whitey, we'd moved the tree upstairs, and loaded it up with as many decorations as was tastefully possible and strung lights upon the fake-snow-covered branches. We finished it all with a tree skirt around the base.

And then someone came up with a creative decorating idea: slipping the Christmas lights under the skirt, creating cool and colourful glow spots. A brilliant touch.

Come Christmas morning, the usual excitement brought us all together around the teeny tree. We passed out the presents and tore through pretty wrapping paper. (Okay, no, who am I kidding. We're Chinese, so we carefully peeled the tape off and folded the wrapping paper up neatly for reuse.)

Now, my mom, unarguably, knows how to dress. And though I'm usually more casual and conservative in my style, Mom is pretty good at getting me clothes that are great for occasions outside of my usual repertoire. I guess that's the fun in having a daughter; you get to dress them up - sometimes even when they're well into their twenties.... But, I digress.

My Christmas gift was a blazer jacket. Midnight blue with bits of white thread, knit, almost like low-pile carpeting. Obviously my mom's shopping.

And then we saw it.

Near the bottom of the buttons, the size of a cherry tomato. A burn mark.

Mom was not happy. She quickly isolated the cause of the burn. In the corner, by the tree, was a matching burn mark in the carpet. My brother and I inhaled sharply.

You see, the offending tungsten Christmas lightbulb, unseen under the tree skirt when the lights were off, became imprisoned between Christmas gift and carpet. After being lit overnight, the bulb eventually burnt right through the tree skirt and gift box, scorching my Christmas present. We're lucky it didn't start a fire.

My poor mom spent an hour picking and scraping away the traces of the burn as best she could, and colouring over with blue marker to make it less obvious.

That jacket has never been worn.

Perhaps I noticed the scorch every time I looked at it, or maybe I really never had that occasion outside my usual repertoire, but I think I might have worn it out once, at most.

As I removed the coat from my wardrobe last night, it saddened me to realise that my mom's care in choosing a gift for me spent over 6 years entirely in the closet. =(

But I'm going to start appreciating. Better late than never. <=)