While I was convalescing with the chicken pox I liked to have
something on my head to keep my sores from touching the pillow that I
was laying on because that made them itch. What felt the best was
this blue and white stripped bag that hung floppy over my head in
what I believed was a pretty jaunty way. I have no idea now why
wearing that stupid bag on my head made me feel so cool but for some
reason it did, and when I had that bag on my head I had a swagger. It
didn't end when I got over the pox either so I cannot chalk it up to
the delirium of illness. For a couple of months after that when I was
at home and wanted to feel cool I would pop the bag on my head and
hang out with my friends or cousins or whomever happened to be in
audience of my great fashion sense. I have some pictures of me in my
bag hat which by the grace of the fashion gods, I never wore out in
public, and I look like a young man with a floppy bag on his head
with none of the talismanic powers of cool it seemed to convey while
it was on my head. I never wish that I was young again. Ever.
