My Mother’s Greatest Gift to me was a Sports Bra

When I was young and found the satin sports bra the color of four o'clock sky in my mother's drawer, I was mystified. How could such a splash of blue and vitality possibly belong to my mother, who wears nothing but white t-shirts and mom jeans, who's wardrobe is as drab as the color of the walls of her office? But there it was. Shimmering like lake water, out of place both in color and in style. Waiting. It was too small to be worn by her again, and too brilliant ever to be thrown away.

I left it there then without telling my mother that I'd had a glimpse into her past. In the ten years since, it's ambled its way into my life and back out again. When I needed a pair of socks or a scarf. When I wanted to get Mom a new shirt and needed her size. Every time I open that drawer I am accosted by the sight of the thing, because I always seem to forget it's there. It goes so against everything I've known about my mother. But since the day I found it, I've loved it from afar, just like I do with Leo DiCaprio.

I bring this all up because my mother offered it to me a month ago along with some old jewelry and a tiny vial of Chanel °5, as we were cleaning out some dusty memories from a shelve. I took it like it was a holy relic. It was the only piece of clothing my mother had ever bequeathed to me.

I'm wearing it now. The thing fit me, and luckily I've got a small window of time before its rein on my body ends as well. It looks like it was temporally relocated right out of an 80's aerobics class, which is incidentally where my mother wore it. As a tribute to her, I'm wearing it to yoga. I haven't gotten any weird looks. Not that I should be getting weird looks: two of these guys wear very tight female yoga pants and one definitely has a skirt. And we all go: ommmmmmmmmm.

And I'm wearing it around the house nowadays and my family has just accepted it, and eventually I'm going to bring it with me to college and it'll find it's way into it's own dusty drawer. The thing is beautiful in a timeless sort of way. It doesn't provide a hell of a lot of support for my breasts, but it provides support for my soul or something, which is where it counts.

And so I feel like my downward dogs and warrior's poses are especially jazzy. My breasts move to the rhythm of each step. And the color of my mother's satin sports bra is coloring my world.