#19: Emergency Undies

That T-Shirt is a Cold Reminder

Feb 05, 2026

Not all reality checks are life threatening

Sunlight pierced the nose slit in my eye mask the other morning.

I didn’t want to wake up, but the morning light had been so bright, reflecting off the two-week-old snow across the rooftops, playgrounds, bike lanes and everywhere else that hasn’t turned to mud or black ice. The view from my window was the usual reminder I hadn’t left the house in a few days. That, and tripping over the mound of coats and cardboard boxes blocking the path out of the room. I dug through my closet, couldn’t find socks, and only found my emergency set of underwear and a t-shirt, the faded, free merch from four jobs ago that you throw on just to make it to the next load of laundry.

I blamed the weekend of the blizzapocalypse-that-wasn’t on the bedroom’s disarray. We threw a party, our first “big” party, the night before the storm. Buy fruit. Scrub some toilets. Buy cheese. Clean the kitchen. Buy ice. I spent most of the day shuttling through the kind of cold that makes your bones hurt when you stand idle. Vaseline and Burt’s Bees were my best friends.

We had to move the clutter scattered throughout the apartment into the bedroom. None of our friends or family would pass a lie detector test to prove we are tidy people, but we try to give them an excuse to pretend when they walk through the door.

Outside the bedroom, the apartment felt like a real livable place. Why move everything back? But there I was, staring at a t-shirt and pair of boxers that should have been recycled way before we even moved into this place. Panic cleaning for friends and hoarding emergency undies are just nodes in the same routine. We stumble through adulthood, faking it as we make it through chores and meals and hygiene. Still, I can’t be wearing dirty undies.

I had to leave our hot apartment, thank god for blessing us with radiator heat, and head the two blocks to the cleaners.

The ride down the elevator was mental preparation. Yeah, it was cold, but I had on my coat and puddle-stompers, the same boots to evade the real threats of the New York sidewalks, semi-truck tall mounds of grey snow encroaching the bus lanes, and piles of trash bags at the foot of those mounds, seeping juices to make a collage of shaved ice, sprinkled with a week’s worth of dog pee and feces. Walkways suffered alongside my apartment, stuck in stasis until the weather would thaw out the excuses for neglect.

I stepped outside. It was just below freezing, but multiple days of single digit weather help you feel the difference. My boots stomped through the black slush and puddles in the asphalt. Shop owners salted their sidewalks, sanitation workers manually shoveled snow, and the city was back to business.

I feared the owner at the cleaners would say “Where have you been? We missed you.”

When my bag hit the scales he said “Good to see you, it will be ready this evening.”

🪞 Reflection

I’ve been in the mood for lighter, more vignette-style stuff recently. Still heavy on observation, but not as emotionally heavy, sitting in the “I don’t know if this is profound, but this thing is interesting” space. Not every week will be like #15 or #17. Sometimes, there’s just dirty laundry you gotta handle.

What have you all thought about the lighter observational posts?

Stay warm and stay safe!

✨ Shiny Things

📚 Story: Tlon, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius by Jorge Luis Borges

This first story of his short story collection Labyrinths, which is a real mind bender. Had to go over this one with a pencil and take notes, but I highly recommend it for a book club if you ever need a short suggestions that pack a punch of a mental puzzle.

🎧 Song: Inner City Blues by Marvin Gaye