The NooNoo

Battersea, Spring 1970:  blundering home in the small hours of a tempestuous night - both social and meteorological - I spotted a bedraggled creature, squirming in the flooded gutter outside my flat. Lungeing to the rescue with squiffy soothing mumblage, I gently gathered up a sodden, furry mass. Blurry lamplit examination revealed a lifeless but intriguing multi-coloured garment. My own  current misery led me to identify with it, curiosity to drag it drippily upstairs, and fatigue to chuck it callously into a corner of the bathroom.

Next day, I washed out the gutter grime, soaked away the suds, and shook out a unique and magical jacket, complete with an obscure French label. Multiple strands in shades of purples and greens produced a shaggy pelt that harmonised with all that I wore and all that I was: the missing link between the random freestyle sixties and the more formulaic glamrock seventies. My wardrobe reflected this fusion, with a recalcitrant section reserved for my working teacher persona. Now, heaven-sent, I held the definitive connective garment.

Thereafter, snug and smug, I wore my foundling prize ceaselessly - even as a dream-weaving bed jacket. It was universally admired. 

Several weeks later, I was set upon outside the flat by a sophisticated but hysterical French woman. She clamoured aggressively at the jacket claiming that she had seemingly 'dreupt eet durang a battle wiz er berfrand  from erpstairs .. and eet curst a LERT of mernay!' Disdainfully and thanklessly deaf to my tale of heroic rescue and recovery, she brutally skinned me of my new identity, and threw it and her horrible self into her horrible red sports car and roared off, never to be seen again.

Suddenly it was a very chilly morning.

So abruptly bereft of my borrowed plumage, my grief was disproportionate and out of character - possibly symptomatic of other changes occurring in my life. I brooded long enough to hatch a resolution ... being pretty proficient in crochet and creative improvisation, I'd just knock up a duplicate. 

Thus galvanised by the buzz of a project, I breezed across the river to Liberty's, where I bagged an exorbitant tonal swag of wools. By the end of the  week I had spawned a feasible replica. It lacked the finesse, the texture, and the bloody Frenchness of the original, but I loved it all the more. Voila my new Battersea Gutter creation - my fluffy armour, my very own NooNoo. 

And so it is that we have worn one another, with the same cosy nonchalence, for over fifty years. Initially a daily fashion statement, but as the years have passed, it has become an ever-present occasional casual, outliving all competitors. 

The NooNoo has acquired the scars and forensic patina of any hide - blobbed with paint and plaster, scorched by cigarettes, blasted by sands and salty sunshine on exotic beaches, tangled in brambles, splattered with food and wine, chomped by puppies, anointed with babysick, doused in dreams, hugged by a host of loved ones, and deeply drenched by every denomination of tears. Careless washes have caused fierce shrinkage, fading and felting; hasty repairs have led to buckling and wrinkles. And for now, the Noo mostly dangles on the bedpost, content in shapeless suspended animation to await the next mission. 

A while ago I was admitted to hospital, unexpectedly and unprepared. My concerned son drove up to visit me, stopping off at home to gather a few essentials:  toothbrush, nightie, knickers, earrings, NooNoo …