73: Murakami and Me and T-Shirts

etc.

Hey Fred,

Thanks for lending me the Murakami book — it was good and the timing was cool. I myself have/had a large tshirt collection that I treasured for years, but spent the last months tearing them apart.

To explain: we’ve been decluttering, after going through the process for both of our parents. Not like Marie Kondo — but trying to save people in the future some time. During COVID, like everyone else, I sought projects, and cataloguing and explaining my shirt collection seemed important for a minute. But after taking pictures of a bunch, and explaining a few, and after our trip especially, I began to wonder: who really cared? Besides myself?

Scott Pilgrim shirt bought from The Beguiling

Most of my collections have carried an unconscious imaginary story, in which somebody marvels at it and asks for the stories it carries. I hadn’t realized the futility of that wish until recently, or the teenage nature of the desire. For this reason alone I maybe shoulda had kids — but that’s no kind of guarantee. I never cared about my dad’s stamps. My houseguests don’t look at my stuff, they eat and chat.

Idle No More shirt. Loved the image, hated the way it fit.

But I’m not the type to throw things out — the other reason for my collections is sentimentality. I like remembering moments through things I can touch.

I also like making stuff into other stuff. So when I saw a cartoonist I admire showing off her rag rug-making skills, I went aHA. At the time I was unable to write or draw, too tired from returning to teaching, but I’m not really any good at sitting still — so I tore almost all of my tshirt collection into as many strips as I could, and then braided those together to make ropes, and then I tied those together, and made a big rug.

Rag Rug made of old T-shirts and sheets

I can still see the old shirts in here — the military green of the War Memorial shirt, the red of the Ramones shirt you gave me, the blue of Pingu. A little flash of yellow on black — that was my Black Sabbath Pope shirt. It never fit, but it was funny.

This was way too big for me, but I bought it cuz it was funny.

I sit on this thing when I meditate now, and I knows it’s a good rug because Stewey likes sitting right in the middle of it. I held back a shirt that shows how little I was when I was 7,

I am number 5. I played one game before quitting.

another from my first concert (Kim Mitchell at Sarnia Arena),

I got Kim Mitchell’s autograph the same day.

and a couple that I thought might be of value to someone someday. But most of my t-shirts are now consolidated into a new thing. When someone someday has to throw it out, I hope they know the story behind it, but if not, at least it’ll be lighter.

I dug Murakami’s essays — they were sweet and easy. I laughed out loud when I read him saying that if he wore a collared shirt his coworkers would ask what was wrong. Some people are apparently just T Shirt people.

Thanks again, and cheers -

jep