Close Textual Reading-- The Yellow Umbrella

In HIMYM (How I Met Your Mother), there is an indicator of important overall plot moments and emotional epiphanies: The Yellow Umbrella. Though it is often brought out on rainy occasions, the umbrella is the harbinger of beneficial change in the sitcom. I am arguing the importance of the Yellow Umbrella as a rhetorical element in How I Met Your Mother. To do this, I will be utilizing close textual analysis to evaluate the text. As defined by Burgchardt: "In practical terms, close textual analysis aims to reveal and explicate the precise, often hidden, mechanisms that give a particular text artistic unity and rhetorical effect" (2010, )

Now, the overall plot of this television series is fairly straightforward: how Ted meets the mother. But, the general and seasonal plot, take some twists and turns along the way. The yellow umbrella moments are the episodes where the umbrella is mentioned or seen. These episodes are like road signs that tell us, "yes, you are still on the right path" because, otherwise, the episodes may seem to never take us any closer to the mother. There are ten yellow umbrella episodes within the series: "Wait for It" (S3E1), "No Tomorrow" (S3E12), "Right Place, Right Time" (S4E22), "Girl Vs. Suits" (S5E12), "Big Days" (S6E1), "No Pressure" (S7E17), "Farhampton" (S8E1), "Something New" (S8E24), "How Your Mother Met Me" (S9E16), and "Last Forever- Part Two" (S9E24).

"Wait for It" is the first episode we, as viewers, hear about the infamous yellow umbrella. Ted is telling his kids about the story where he was attempting to win the breakup with Robin and ended up with a butterfly tattoo. Ted prefaces this story by telling his kids that though they know the story of the yellow umbrella, there is a bigger version of this tale that includes the story of how he became the man he needed to be in order to meet the mother. In "No Tomorrow" we see the place where Ted starts this journey. Ted and Barney go to a St. Patrick's Day party at a club and do some disreputable things and somehow, it ends up with good consequences for the both of them. The next morning Ted tells Marshall everything that happens and Marshall reminds Ted that that is not the person he has ever wanted to be. Ted goes back to the club to get his phone that was left there and, as it starts to rain, grabs the abandoned yellow umbrella he finds by the door of the club. The viewers find out that the mother was in that club that night and that Ted is glad she didn't meet him that night because he didn't think she would have liked him very much.

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Ted goes on (in some non-yellow umbrella episodes) to get his butterfly tattoo removed and meets a tattoo removal specialist named Stella who he falls in love with and gets engaged to. She then leaves him at the alter for her ex and breaks Ted's heart. In "Right Place, Right Time,"Ted takes a break from designing a cowboy hat-shaped rib joint to go get a bagel on a rainy day. He uses the yellow umbrella (obviously) and runs into Stella and her husband as she is about to cross the street. Her husband, Tony, ends up getting Ted a job as a university professor. This job is what leads to Ted meeting Cindy in "Girls vs. Suits." This is where Ted takes Cindy on a date and we find out that the mother is Cindy's roommate. Though Ted nor the audience ever see the mother in this episode, we do get our first description of her and Ted sights her ankle as she runs into the bathroom. Ted ends up leaving the yellow umbrella at the apartment when he figures out he has more in common with Cindy's roommate (the mother) than Cindy.

Cindy returns to the yellow umbrella storyline in "Big Days" where Ted sees a pretty girl at MacClaren's with Cindy and thinks it could be her roommate. The girl ends up kissing Cindy and is, therefore, not the mother. In this episode, it is revealed that Ted meets the mother on the day of a wedding. The episode flashes to said wedding, where Ted is best man, and it starts to rain. Ted laments about not bringing an umbrella to the wedding, because the umbrella is in the mother's possession.

In "No Pressure," we find out that Ted has not said "I love you" to a woman since Robin. During this journey of self-discovery, Ted figures out that Barney is the reason he has not settled for Robin yet. Ted asks Robin if she loves him and she says no. Because of this revelation, Marshall asks Robin to move out of the apartment so Ted can move on, and she does. Ted finds closure in his relationship for Robin and the world becomes his for the taking. At the end of this episode he walks out of the apartment and sees a dozen women with yellow umbrella walking on the sidewalk.

The last four episodes on the yellow umbrella journey all coincide with Robin and Barney's wedding. "Farhampton" starts off with Robin being a jittery bride and asking Ted to recount the story of trying to steal Victoria back on her wedding day. At the end of this story, Ted runs into Victoria's fíance, Klaus, and talks to him about knowing "the one" when you see them. After Ted returns Victoria to her wedding day, we get to see the mother with the yellow umbrella getting out of a taxi next to Ted after Barney and Robin's wedding. In "Something New," we watch Ted struggle once again with his feelings for Robin and tell Lily that he is planning on moving to Chicago after the
wedding. This is also the episode where we see the mother carrying a bass guitar and the yellow umbrella as she buys a train ticket to get to Farhampton and we see her face for the first time.

"How Your Mother Met Me" is a unique twist on the show for the 200th episode and gives us some interesting insight on the story from the mother's perspective, including how the yellow umbrella was originally hers and how she lost it and magically got it back in her apartment one day. At the end of this episode we see the mother pull out her ukulele and go onto the terrace where Ted hears her sing "La Vie en Rose" from the balcony over. In "Last Forever- Part 2," Ted meets the mother and they have a cheesy conversation about who the yellow umbrella originally belonged to because they share the same initials: T.M. (Tracy McConnell and Ted Mosby).

The yellow umbrella is a very effective piece of rhetoric that is used to drive plot and indicate moments of importance to the audience. In over 200 episodes it is only seen eight times and referenced twice, making the sighting of it very enthralling to the audience. The rain that pulsed down over Ted's love life had a spot of sunlight in it for nine years because that yellow umbrella foreshadowed the sunniest sky his love life could ever encounter: "The One."

References:
Burgchardt, C. (2010). Readings in Rhetorical Criticism (4th ed.). Strata: State College.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pyFXtZ4fDfQ