The Shirt Off My Back

By Andrea Canale

If you haven't any charity in your heart, you have the worst kind of heart trouble.

~Bob Hope

It was as if a supernatural force had overtaken me. My heart fluttered and my legs had a mind of their own.

"Look, Mom!" I exclaimed, pointing to a giant sign across the mall.

"What is it?" she asked.

"Everything is ninety percent off!" My voice reached an octave higher than normal.

"Let's take a look," Mom said.

"Wow! Good find, Andrea," said my sister Juliana.

We marched straight to our favorite store. Once inside, we found ourselves amidst the bustling frenzy of shoppers. We strolled through the cloud of perfume, past the cosmetic counters, directly to the racks of clothes.

"These T-shirts are only two dollars!" Juliana exclaimed.

We snaked through the crowd. I started grabbing as many shirts as I could. There were five different shades of purple and since I couldn't decide, I took all of them.

"This sale is awesome!" I said as I flipped through the sea of blues.

"Try them on," Mom said. "They are so cheap."

I snatched them all off the hangers. Before I went into the changing room, Mom whipped out her calculator, punched in numbers and calculated our savings.

"These jeans are only seven dollars," Juliana said, leaning over Mom's shoulder.

Even though I didn't need them, I carried the jeans into the fitting room. The shopping ritual was something I experienced each year during the holidays and before school. I had taken whatever was in reach and the miniscule changing room was overflowing with clothes. As I stood knee-deep in a colorful mountain of T-shirts, I realized I did not have enough room to store them all. Did I really need these?

I started thinking about all the children who never got new clothes. I lived the first year of my life in an orphanage in Buzau, Romania where the children had nothing. My sister and I were both adopted from there, and my mother made sure to ship boxes of clothes to the orphans in Romania every year. Each summer, my parents, sister and I dedicated a day to sifting through our closets and choosing some clothing to share.

Sometimes my mother convinced me to give away clothing that I still liked a lot, but other times it wasn't as hard as I often had brand new clothing that I had been given for Christmas or birthdays that I didn't even use.

As I stood among the piles of clothes in the cramped dressing room, I turned to Mom as she neatly folded the shirts I set aside to purchase. "I have enough," I said.

Mom stared blankly.

"I'm not going to buy these."

"Which ones did you decide not to buy?"

"I want all of them, but I don't need anything." I licked my lips and sighed deeply. "I'm not going to buy any of these." My eyes glistened with tears as I pictured dozens of kids running around, playing happily in my hand-me-down clothes. I certainly didn't need any new clothing, when I already has so much. A smile tugged at the corners of my mouth. "I need to go home and clean out my closet." I don't know any of the Romanian orphans, but I know I would give them the shirt off my back.

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