One the nicest gifts I ever received was an embroidered black pashmina scarf. It felt delicious in my hands and the detailing of flowers around the edges was gorgeous. I couldn’t actually believe that someone at work was giving me something so divine and so personally appropriate as a holiday gift. I hung it over my chair to always be able to see something beautiful in my little gray cube.
Each day, I would look at the pashmina and still brought a smile to my face. There would be many days where I wouldn’t even wear it, just look at it or rub my hand against it. I really considered bringing it home to pair with some of my fancy dresses. And the rainy February day that I flung it over my shoulders to warm me up, I mentally reminded myself to bring it home with me.
In a busy work day, so much can fly off the rails. As my pashmina was warming me up that day, so too was my blood heating up at an error that I swear I did not make. I was in the middle of quickly scurrying about, trying to find all the information I could to prove my innocence. I was just about to be called into the ‘big’ office to produce my defense, when the judge came out of her office. She took one look at me, my heart sinking with what I thought would be coming from her mouth. But instead she uttered,
“What are you wearing?”
I looked down at my outfit that day and muttered something about the store. As she approached the doorway of my cube, she pointed to my beautiful pashmina and said, “no, that.” I explained the holiday gift and expressed my adoration.
“It’s mine.”
My mind quickly tried to register the conversation. It switched from needing to defend myself to one of intense inquiry. I could not understand what was happening.
“Oh, you have one like it?” was all I could reply.
“No, that one. It’s mine. I want it back.”
My mouth must have gaped or contorted. I turned for support at the co-worker who had presented the gift to me, my eyes pleading for some explanation. She sat stunned.
A story came from the judge’s mouth about a mix-up in the many pashminas that were brought back. How this pashmina was in a special pile. That she also bought a matching brown one and was wondering as to where the black one had gone.
My mind though, “Oh, good. She has a brown one. That should be good enough.”
And yet, the judge didn’t move from my doorway. There were no other options tossed about. In fact, the only action occurring in the silence was that of my hand unwrapping the pashmina from around my body and handing it to her.
A curt, “thanks.” And she vanished back to the ‘big’ office. I sat stunned at what happened – literally facing the cube doorway until I could bring myself to swivel back around. In luck, she had forgotten all about the defense that I was about to present. The pashmina was never ever mentioned again.
A replacement pashmina was gifted to me later that week by the original gift giver. Her embarrassment and stunned look still present as she handed it to me. The new pashmina, colorfully designed, while lovely will never quite hold the beauty of the black pashmina. But where it lacks in beauty, it makes up for in meaning.
I have kept the replacement pashmina placed over my chair at each of my subsequent workplaces. To me, the pashmina is a reminder of the absurdities of life – particularly, the strangeness of power and our (in)ability to let *things* go. On the days when I feel my own power soar, it serves to bring me down to earth and calls me to remember what it took to get here.
It also still functions to keep me warm on cold February days.