It’s taken a lot of hard work, determination, and dresses without pockets to get here. Over the past thirty-five years, I’ve deprived myself of so much — namely substantial pockets at fancy occasions. All because I knew my training was leading me to this day, when I would throw on a dress with pockets and SAVE THE WORLD.

You know those athletes who train by wearing masks that limit their oxygen intake? I’d pass them, day after day, dress after dress with no pockets, and they’d gasp in terror. “No! It’s too dangerous!” they’d yell. But I refused to stop. For they were but men, and they underestimated what a woman without pockets could do.

But after spraining my flexor tendons carrying my phone in my hand for twenty-four hours straight, I almost gave up. Until I saw a little girl pick up a dead bird she’d found. “Can you put it in your pocket?” she asked her mother. The woman, helpless, BURST INTO TEARS. When I got home that day, I removed all the pockets from my clothes — they were uselessly small anyway. And I vowed to push myself even harder; to never give up until I’d achieved POCKET NIRVANA.

I knew my training had to be more than physical. I couldn’t keep exerting so much brain power trying to figure out what to do with my hands while standing still. All that brilliance wasted. I could have rid the world of cancer, or of male comedians. But instead, my brain was preoccupied with fingertip placement, palm curvature, and forearm tension. I had to train MY MIND.

When I woke each morning, I imagined I was a kangaroo, stepping out of a marsupial pocket. When I went to bed each night, I dreamed I was a pocket searching for its palm mate. I replaced all my bread with pita. Oh, the taste of a pocket. My shoes were no longer shoes — they were pockets for my feet. And when I masturbated it was to the thought of a supple pocket against my skin.

Until one day, while wearing a dress with no pockets at all, I felt my shoulders relax. My heart rate was strong and slow. My mind was as clear as a contact lens — a pocket for the eye. In a pocketless existence, I felt as if pockets were everywhere, and on everything.

It WAS TIME. I didn’t need pockets, but what could I achieve if I had pockets?

It’s almost like there’s too much pocket, I think and laugh, my hands resting easy between folds of cotton. I turn to the stranger next to me and demand, “THE TROUBLE — point me to it.”

A man harassing a woman on the train? Move aside, civilians. I’m armed with pockets and dangerous.

A kitten stuck up a tree? No need for the fire department — I’ll get you down, kitten, and teach you about foresight as I gently place you in the arms of mother cat. She’s been overwhelmed by trying to HAVE IT ALL. “Get yourself some pockets,” I whisper to her with a wink.

Global warming? Call all the sewing people. First, ask what name they shall be called because “seamstress” is gendered. Second, gather them together to make a dress with pockets big enough to fit THE EARTH.

Bigotry and hatred proliferate in all corners of existence? Give EVERYONE a dress with pockets. Let their fingernails and knuckles and all the parts of a hand know the loving embrace of a pocket. Their souls shall brim with self-love, and this love shall spill over gloriously, like a pocket enveloping all manner of dead birds. And they shall see each other in their POCKETED HUMANITY.

And now I stand in the town square throwing dresses with pockets to the townspeople as they weep with joy. “You get a dress with pockets! And you get a dress with pockets!” is what Oprah should have said. But she never could have, because she wasn’t wearing a dress with pockets. The townspeople fall to their knees. “Arise,” I say to them. “And don ye dresses with pockets.” As they do, they ascend to the heavens like angels without wings. For who needs wings when you’ve got a dress WITH POCKETS.