To Vest or Not to Vest

In 2002, I visited Whistler with my cousin and friend Rozan to have an ultimate snowboarding trip.  My one souvenir was a vest with the resort's logo on it.   Throughout the years, I barely wore it.   I either wore an entire jacket or none at all and the vest lay dormant in my closet.  When we left Northern California for Florida, I would have thrown away the clothing if I had been a more thorough packer and found it.  As it turned out, I was in a stack of bags that I barely had time to sort before we loaded it on the rental truck and drove it along with a dozen other (smaller-sized) clothes from my time as a young adult.

Fast forward to Summer 2014 and our living in a bus has made me donate more and more clothes out of a necessity to downsize.  I saw the vest & a rain suit and was about to donate them when I realized that they might be handy for layering.  I remember holding up the vest and thinking, "How does this help anyone?!?  Unless someone has well-insulated fat arms, they're going to want to cover more than just their core with a vest!   What a silly invention!"

Fall arrives and I'm still fine with my Target sweat jacket.  The rain suit turned out to be so poorly made that the vinyl that had made it water-proof was sticking to itself and peeling off.  I didn't even bother donating it to the thrift shop; I walked it straight to the dumpster.  The vest, however, lay in the bathroom (our current supplement closet) still neither proving invaluable nor ineffective.  

The weather turned more chilly than I had ever experienced when the wind speed reached 25 mph.   My cotton sheathing was no match for the raging tempest!  My thoughts ran not yet to the vest but to a giant woolly mammoth of a jacket that I had to buy at whatever cost to protect my frigid bones.  The next day I wanted to search, but our list of activities was too full and I ran out of time to buy something affordable and nearby.  Feeling illness and body aches coming, I put on as many clothes as I could including the now infamous vest.

By golly, that vest was amazing!!  I was able to protect my chest and neck but still wash the dishes on a high-40 degree morning!  A big poofy, jacket would never allow me the mobility!  

I now wear the vest so much that Simone asked why I love it so much.  It's true.  I love it!  It only took 12 years before I removed the shackles of skepticism and saw it's worth.  I guess it took a dire situation to reveal the diamond in the rough, but better late than never!