Shopping for My Hat

I mentioned I was going to a hat shop on State Street in Madison to buy a hat to cover my silly hair for the presentation next week on my Civil War book. Below is what occurred.

I was in the hat shop with my silly hair showing as I tried on hats, and explained to the man there that I was taking a drug that was saving my life but making my hair a mess and I needed to cover it up, especially for a presentation I was giving on the Civil War.

The old fashioned hats just didn't work for me and elicited chuckles from my husband and smiles from the man in the hat shop who began helping me find hats. He was my height with beautiful slightly curled shoulder length grey hair, a winning smile and he walked with difficulty, an awareness I am more conscious of than previously. He was dressed in jeans and a plaid flannel shirt.

I tried everything from broad brimmed hats to berets. He put on a beret at a jaunty angle over his beautiful grey hair, and told me he had checked on the internet for the proper way to wear a beret and this was it. He smiled broadly.

He brought me a knitted beret type hat that I imagined my grandmother could have worn in the 1930s. Okay, it isn't quite Civil War vintage, but it did look okay. At least my husband smiled and didn't chuckle and the man in the shop didn't either. I said I thought it would work. After all, I just needed to look a bit old fashioned. The hat shop man tried to sell my husband a Civil War hat, but he refused. (We had told the man my husband would be accompanying my presentation on his harmonica.)

The hat shop man began to write up the receipt for my hat. He stopped and stood quietly for a moment. Then he said, "I understand life threatening conditions. I have Parkinson's." Then he said his doctor said he was a good candidate for the brain surgery.

So I told him about Alice, about my friend who had the brain surgery and how it had helped her. And the man said, "By the end of the day my walking gets more difficult, listening and speaking become more difficult. I just want something that will give me a few more good hours each day. If the surgery would help with that it would be worth it."

I paid the money for the hat, we took each other's hands and wished each other well. We both wanted similar things: he a few more hours in the day, me a few more years.

One never knows. Someone who is a writer, although she claims she is not, gave another knowledge she could use in a second hand way, like someone being two hands away from someone famous.

Yesterday a man courageously spoke from his heart to a strange lady with funny hair in a hat store, and she just happened to know something about why he had difficulty walking. Perhaps that meeting was just what he needed to make that decision to make his life better. One just never knows.

Love, Carol

Carol,

I believe it was very important for you to be in that hat shop at that time. All of our lives are interconnected, We are all participants in the same universe, all part of one big story. The fact that you know Alice and had read her book made you a messenger, for a moment to another participant who needed to know what you had to tell him.

I believe these encounters happen for a reason.

Ann

I do not believe in coincidence either, Ann. I believe we are all just ripples in the water, carrying what we know and what we have been given out into the world. I am sure the store owner took in what you said carol, and will probably be helped, much as Alice has been. We can hope, at any rate.

Now we need a picture of you in your new hat!

I was cleaning up around here and found the bag for my hat. I have always called the hat shop, The Hat Shop on State Street. State Street runs for about four blocks between the state capital and the university. It is an interesting street with ethnic restaurants, many shops, an old theater and the new civic center, and is always filled with university students.

However, the shop is called, "The Sacred Feather." It has been there a long time and is in an interesting old building set back from the others on the street.

Thanks for your comments.

Carol

http://www.sacredfeather.com/

Carol,
wouldn't a wig be a better solution?

Shelagh,

You are amazing! That is the hat shop!

Abe,

We discussed this here and decided hats were the answer.

Carol

Oh, that shop is lovely!!! Thanks for posting the pic, Shelagh. I, too, want to see a pic of you in your new hat, Carol.

Isn't it amazing how one conversation in a hat shop can provide us with a chance to connect with another person on a deeper level? Your story gave me chill bumps, Carol. What a blessing you are and what a blessing Alice is. You have both touched another person's soul, no matter what his final decision is.

What a cute shop! Yes, you must post a picture, Carol! Loved the story, and I feel the same way about meeting people for a reason.

I'm looking forward to reading Alice's book, too.

I like to see a woman wearing a hat. Real class. I like to see a man wearing a hat, too, but baseball caps do not qualify unless he is playing baseball. I always wear a hat outside because I can't do a thing with my hair on a windy day.
As for Shelagh's picture - how does she do it?

My Uncle Feagin always wore a hat. My nephew, Lucas, who was born the year my brother, his father, turned 40, always wanted to dress like his great uncle*. That meant, in his 3-year-old phrase: "Hat-suit-pipe."

* Uncle Feagin explained to my children and their cousins that it was too hard to say "Great Uncle Feagin," so they should just call him The Great Feagin. They always did.

Ann

Google is your friend, Dick.