I went to Home Depot today, as I too often do. Aimlessly wandering the aisles looking for nothing more in particular than what I came for (as I too often do), my brainstormings were interrupted by a sweet, short older lady. She, keeping a polite distance from this total stranger, asked with checked excitement “Where did you get that shirt?” The shirt in question is a deep yellow t-shirt with the word “ATLAS” in three-inch bold letters across the chest, and “Air Conditioning” in smaller italics underneath. I bought this gem at a Goodwill in San Marcos before a river trip three years ago. These trips are reckless good fun, and having lost many things of value on them over the years, I had opted to get some sweet tubing duds on the cheap. Had I worn anything that cost more than the two dollars I spent on this mango marvel, I certainly would have lost it. But the river didn’t want this shirt, so I still have it. And for whatever reason, I wear it more often than a lot of other shirts.
And so I was wearing it again today. At the end of the aisle there in Home Depot, I told this pleasant stranger I had bought the shirt in San Marcos. I didn’t tell her why; she clearly seemed to see more in it then my river revelry would do justice to. She said her dad had worked for Atlas Air Conditioning many years ago. She described their vans that were the same color as my shirt. The more she said, the more she smiled in a far-away kind of way, and the closer she leaned, looking wistfully at the ATLAS across my chest. She made it close enough to reach out and touch my arm, gently, like a caring old friend. And she said in a fond sort of remembrance “I doubt they’re still around anymore… but this is neat.” She was talking to a complete stranger, but in her glowing expression, her sweet smile, and gentle touch that lingered for a few extra moments on my arm, I couldn’t help but feel like she was seeing something much, much more familiar.
