I feel the most beautiful when I am wearing my black fleece turtleneck with thumbholes.
It is itchy and I will inevitably perspire if I wear it in any temperature above 40 degrees. It is a shapeless cut and thus I am imperceptibly womanly. It takes no form anywhere except around my wrists and at the folds that begin at my collarbone, where the ribbed knitting doubles over to swallow my neck and vows to protect it.
I like to put on this black turtleneck after I shower, especially when that shower is accompanied by grooming, plucking, lotioning and smoothing.
I like when my straw-colored hair pokes out of the collar in disarray, disproportionate locks sprouting from high and low places.
This turtleneck looks nice when it lays across tanned summer skin, even though it is indubitably made for the season’s counterpart.
I prefer looking at this turtleneck on my body especially when I am in the bathroom of my childhood bedroom. The same mirror and lighting that has projected my image before school in the days of lockers, lunchboxes, and P.E.
The very same mirror and lighting that has revealed my face’s wreckage before an early morning airport departure, around 3 or 4am, when the rest of the house is strangely still and dark. The same mirror under the same lighting that I climbed up so near to, to get a peek at my mouth when I still had braces on my teeth. The place where I sat with my kneecaps pressing upon the cold glass, cross legged, practicing eyeliner for the first time while a Youtube tutorial blared from my lap.
I like this turtleneck best when my gold and silver jewelry complement its starkness. I like it on my body, and not because it is sensationally flattering or exceedingly comfortable. I like it on my body because it is modest and it doesn’t boast. It does not take center stage and it hushes itself when in the mirror's presence. It is the opener for the main act, the maître d' for the waitress, the tee for the golfer.
This black turtleneck sanctions me to recollect all of the memories that my mirror held as I stare inside of it, fascinated by the way it watched me grow into the human I am now. With such poise, with such quiet reverence. I cock my head and think of how that mirror presented my picture back to me since I first became conscious of my image. It saw me try on thousands of articles of clothes that hugged me wrong and others that sat just right. It helped me locate the freckle on my back I cannot peer to see just by craning my neck. It was the reflection in which I practiced smiling for picture day and where I checked to see what I looked like in the aftermath of a wet and sloppy sob. It presented my face and flesh sometimes insultingly, but mostly compassionately.
If it wasn’t for this turtleneck that is oh so reverent, I probably wouldn’t have thanked the mirror.
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