Sewn inside the jacket from our new winter capsule are the words “You don’t know it yet, but these are the good old days”.
It’s a mantra I’ve tried, and sometimes failed, to live by over the last nine months. Because for all the ways in which juggling a toddler, a business, moving countries and preparing to have a baby have felt impossible, I also know in my bones that these are the moments I’ll look back on and miss most. I’ve tried really hard to not lose sight of the fact that I’m living through the best days of my life.
Wrapped up in the bittersweet decision to return to New Zealand for six months was the realization that I’d be able to give Ralph a slice of my childhood. He’s entering that stage where, whatever happens next, will likely become his earliest memories of “life”. So for him to spend it like I did - feeding chickens, meeting the lambs in spring, wearing redband gumboots and putting his hands in the dirt - feels like a gift I almost missed. His earliest memories might now mirror mine.
Okay…and a little something about this jacket. On a trip home last year I took a jacket from my dad’s wardrobe, the smell of pine needles and sawdust embedded in its fibres, and marked down all of the measurements. I love that feeling of being swallowed up by my clothes in winter. When you sit in a jacket big enough to wrap across your body and still have room to spare. It’s the same feeling I get when I slide into the booth at a restaurant, relieved to be cocooned and protected from whatever’s happening outside. This jacket, in a chocolate corduroy that only gets softer with time, and shoulders you can sink into, reminds me of Dads and I hope the smell of home clings to its fibres too.
