CLOTH PEOPLE COME WHEN YOU LEAST EXPECT THEM<\/strong>
\nWord Count: 367<\/p>\n

The mornings are yellow-gray and full of tree frogs. They chirp a background song of camaraderie and fondness for the night. Somewhere not far from where you now live, a Cloth Person sneaks into your cellar.<\/p>\n

Though no one truly knows this as fact, the Cloth People are believed to be born in the Salvation Army bins in the corners of parking lots at the mall. They are the throwaways of their society, no longer the belle of the parties, they are outgrown, stained by living, some often still wet with widow\u2019s tears. They\u2019ve been pulled from their homes in the morning and driven away to be left in a box among strangers. That\u2019s why they\u2019re afraid of the day.<\/p>\n

They huddle together, lost in the dark and rejected, finding comfort in someone else\u2019s spilled bag. They tell each other their stories of happier times that always sadly end the same way. In a pile. In the dark. Where lonely things go. Mended and patched, they sometimes rise and escape into the night.<\/p>\n

The one that I met once at midnight was a chocolate bar pillow of a man. He was solid and sturdy except for the tweed wool of his feet that glared in the moonlight that fell into my room. I was startled but not really frightened. Since my husband had died nothing could frighten me anymore. Who are you?<\/em> I asked, and he told me he\u2019d once lived in a penthouse down in the city and was thrown out after divorce.<\/p>\n

We sat up late talking. I made coffee since I couldn\u2019t sleep. We each had our sad tales and good days to share, and morning light soon unweighted the windows.<\/p>\n

I must get away from the daylight<\/em>, he whispered and got up to steal into the still darkened hall. You can stay here<\/em>, I told him, without knowing why, and I opened a closet where my coats still clung to the London Fog<\/em> raincoat, the parka my husband used shoveling snow. I pushed open a space where I knew he could fit and get used to the fabrics around him. And that\u2019s where he stayed, until it was safe to come out.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

CLOTH PEOPLE COME WHEN YOU LEAST EXPECT THEM Word Count: 367 The mornings are yellow-gray and full of tree frogs. They chirp a background song of camaraderie and fondness for the night. Somewhere not far from where you now live, … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6,19],"tags":[5],"class_list":["post-425","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-100-days-2011","category-magical-realism","tag-magical-realism"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog3\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/425","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog3\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog3\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog3\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog3\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=425"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog3\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/425\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1032,"href":"https:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog3\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/425\/revisions\/1032"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog3\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog3\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susangibb.net\/blog3\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}