Building confidence through a color known for sadness. Blue.
The National Blue and Corn Gold corduroy jacket is stiff, uncomfortable, and somehow makes you hotter in the heat and colder in the cold. It wrinkles in places you wish it wouldn’t, carries pins that tell stories most people will never know, and has your name carefully stitched across the front. Yet somehow, it becomes one of the hardest things to take off. I know this now, but before I entered high school, I never understood why.
My sister was in FFA, and whenever she would tell me about it, I would never listen because that was boring high school stuff, and it didn’t apply to me. One day, though, she came home with this blue, textured jacket that was stiff as a board. I didn’t question where it came from; I just knew I never wanted to wear something that looked like that. She would leave for weekend trips, stuffing that jacket into her suitcase, or leave the house for an event wearing it. I watched her do this over and over without ever understanding why that jacket mattered so much. I didn’t realize then that years later, I would be the one carefully folding my own jacket into a suitcase, wearing it to competitions, and eventually wondering how I would ever take it off for the last time.
When I first joined FFA, all of the cool seniors were expressing how important it is to have your own jacket. How it gives you confidence, dignity, and changes you in ways you’ll never know. They told me how there is no better feeling than someone reading your jacket and seeing your name, not a random name because you are borrowing a jacket. They told me the stiffness of the jacket, and the fact that it makes you hotter in the heat and colder in the cold, is something I will miss once I graduate. They talked about this jacket like it was their security blanket, and they would have done anything to continue wearing it and representing what it represents.
Now, as I am a senior, I finally understand what they meant.
I have specific pieces of my official dress that are my “lucky pieces,” and they consist of what I wore to my first public speaking competition: Creed Speaking, where I got third in the competition but was able to advance to sectionals. When I got first at sectionals and realized my second chance was a gift, I deemed every piece I wore that day as lucky.
Those specific pieces of clothing—the shirt and skirt my sister let me have, the scarf and flats I randomly inherited, and the heels I caved and bought, along with the excessive amounts of nylons that will rip if the air hits them wrong—have watched me compete at state for various competitions, win state for Parliamentary Procedure and Agricultural Issues, compete at nationals, get elected for chapter office twice, and get elected as the Blue Mountain District Treasurer.
But all of these accomplishments aren’t what makes me lucky.
These accomplishments aren’t what built my confidence, dignity, resilience, and appreciation for the little things. It was the National Blue and Corn Gold corduroy jacket that rests on my back.
It’s the jacket that carries my name, accomplishments on pins, and how it rooted me in an organization that changed me in ways I can never comprehend. It’s the livestock projects that pushed us to our limits, but we wish we could have one more day with them, to show them off in a ring one last time. It’s the SAE projects we spent countless hours on to perfect. It’s the genuine friendships I made with people who also wear this jacket, whose jackets also have their names on them and pins that display their accomplishments. It’s the people who are from a different chapter or state who welcome anyone with open arms because that’s how the jacket raised us. It’s the advisors who put in countless hours to make sure that, no matter what, we are able to wear this jacket, with our name, chapter, and state carefully stitched on it. So we can represent more than an organization, but ourselves.
Blue has seen both sides of my FFA experience. It has seen the disappointment of not placing in a competition I worked so hard on, by myself and with a team. But it has also seen me become part of teams where I gained friends I could trust and rely on. It has seen nervous competitors become confident leaders, strangers become lifelong friends, and failures become reasons to keep going. The blue corduroy jacket has carried me through both the highs and lows of FFA, and somehow, it has made me appreciate both.
The blue corduroy jacket is, in my opinion, the most symbolic part of this organization. Whether you are traveling to a local competition or even National Convention, I am sure one person has asked you if you were a flight attendant. When you said, “No, I am a part of FFA,” you were able to explain the joys of this organization. In that moment, my friend, you practiced brotherhood and honored agricultural opportunities.
Maybe that’s what makes the jacket so special. It gives us an opportunity to explain FFA to someone who has never heard of it, but it also reminds us of everything we’ve ever experienced inside of it. Every pin, wrinkle, and thread carries a memory.
When I eventually take my jacket off for the last time, I know I won’t just be taking off a piece of clothing. I’ll be taking off a piece of the person FFA helped me become.
