Katie had to go outside earlier than usual, at 5:30 a.m., this warm November morning.  After we got back inside I went back to bed, turning off the alarm clock, sure I’d be awake at 6  like always.  Instead I went on a wild purple adventure.

I was in a small town, perhaps intermingled with a college campus.  Lots of brick buildings and large trees. I went into a gift shop that was attached to a larger building.  For some reason I was attracted by a purple plaid adult size suit.  The fabric was somewhere between flannel and wool, and it was all over, head to toe, purple and gold plaid.  The top had a hood that almost covered my face.  I know that because I decided to try it on.  In the back of the store.

I took off my pants and shirt and slipped awkwardly into the purple plaid outfit.  I noticed one of the sales women keeping an eye on me and I was sure she thought I intended to shoplift the outfit.  As if I could actually walk out covered entirely in plaid and not get noticed!  I struggled to get it all on, pulled the hood over my head and decided I needed it.

So, still fully clothed in plaid I went up to the counter to pay for it.  I told the astonished saleswomen that I could use it to be the Cookie Monster, but in retrospect I’d have made a better Barney.  Anyway, I start searching in my purse for my wallet.  The purse is filled with the normal debris that accumulates in a purse.  Receipts and crumpled gum wrappers.  There was a large coin purse shaped like a elephant, pretty beat up, with someone else’s name on it.  That confused me.  How had I acquired it?  There were lots of gift cards and bonus cards from assorted stores.  Worn out tissues.  I began to pull all this out onto the store counter, searching for my wallet and my credit cards.  Even the sales lady stopped what she was doing to help me look.  No luck.  Finally I told her I’d go change out of the purple outfit, go home, find my wallet and come back.  The growing line of people waiting behind me breathed a collective sigh of relief.

I decided to change back into my own clothes in a bathroom rather than the back of the store, so I went in search of one.  Out in the hall of the larger building I found a bathroom, but it was decrepit and partially outside.  The stall door wouldn’t stay shut; you had to hold it shut while you used the toilet.  So I tried to do that, wearing my purple outfit, holding the door shut I realized the side wall of the stall was missing and I was outside near a high school.  And that I had forgotten my jeans and sweatshirt to change back into anyway.

So I left the quasi-bathroom and headed back to the store, but it wasn’t where I thought it was and now I was lost.  Evening was approaching.  I went into another store and the husband of the saleswoman there said he’d take me over to my original store.  I felt ridiculous as I was still dressed head to toe in purple plaid.  He starts walking really fast and I can’t keep up and then I trip on some bumpy ground and fall behind a school bus.  When I crawl out from behind the bus I can’t see the man anymore, so I’m back to wandering around.

I pass some people planting purple and green plants in beds around light poles.  And it’s darker and I’m wandering near a big empty high school when I finally see the man who was supposed to take me back to the store.  He’s sitting on a bench, one ankle on the other knee, arms spread across the top of the bench.  I walk toward him, finally relieved that there is someone who will help me.

As I reach him I ask myself if this is perhaps the beginning of dementia.  That I’m feeling the way someone on the verge of full blown Alzheimers might feel.  The knowing what you’re doing that turns into complete chaos.  The not understanding why or how or where.   Right from the beginning of this adventure, somewhere in the back of my mind I didn’t understand why I’d want a purple suit, or why I’d change in the back of the store, or why I couldn’t find my wallet, or why there were other people’s stuff in my purse.  Nothing made sense even before the wandering around and not recognizing anything or even where I’d been just moments before.

I woke up glad I don’t own any purple plaid.  And glad I have no aspirations to be a purple plaid cookie monster.  Or even worse, Barney.