Tuesday, November 30, 2021 Fashion

A word about fashion is in order at this point. Fashion and I were not really on speaking terms. This was not entirely my fault, as I was dependent on Mom to buy my clothes and in her pragmatic way, she wasn’t really into following all the latest fashions, particularly if they were expensive. But on my part, I wasn’t terribly observant about the latest “thing” either. Even so, I had a feeling that cousin Mitch’s hand-me-down pants were not good enough and I had started to notice that everyone was wearing “bell bottoms.” I was slow to get to the starting line, but once there, I was all in. I HAD TO HAVE BELL BOTTOMS.

I begged my mom to buy me some, but this was an extra expense in which she wasn’t willing to indulge, since I already had enough pants to wear. Believe me, when I read about Anne Shirley and her desire for puffed sleeves, I knew she and I were soul sisters. To be fair (in retrospect) to my parents, they were stretched pretty thin with 6 children on a school teacher’s salary, but as a child, I didn’t have that perspective and felt quite cruelly deprived of the one thing that could make me happy and popular, all in one fell swoop. So, I did the next best thing: I saved my babysitting money and finally bought a pair for myself. Those first bell bottoms were magically beautiful and I was so proud of them. They had a blue and white paisley design; I felt like part of the Mod Squad when wearing them (this reminds me that I need to tackle the subject of television shows soon). I wonder if there’s a picture of me wearing them? I floated along in my newly found fashionista persona for a short time, but one sad, sad day I overheard someone say to someone else “Look at that girl wearing those high water pants! Ha ha!” Much laughter ensued and to my horror, I realized that they were talking about ME, me in my beautiful bell bottom pants, the only ones I owned. It turns out that after a few washings they had shrunk and no longer reached to the floor, which was a fashion sin about which I was unaware until that moment. Naturally, the pants had to be retired. You couldn’t pay me any amount of money to make me go through junior high school again. Sigh…

When I was 12 years old, my parents gave me a Glorious Outfit for my birthday: a purple skirt (knee length), matching purple vest, and a blouse which was white with some sort of purple design (probably paisley – I’m not kidding). They also gave me some tights to wear with the outfit. Remember, I was the fourth child, the second girl, and I did not get a lot of new clothes. I could hardly wait to debut the GO in school the next day. I strutted around in that thing and felt good, really good to be alive. Somewhere around the second class of the day, the tights snagged on something and completely fell apart. That took quite a bit of the shine off of the experience – I think I probably had to take them off – but the GO was still special and I really appreciated my parents going the extra mile to give me something so nice to wear. I think they had noticed my burgeoning desire to be fashionable and although they couldn’t afford to fill my closet with all the latest clothing styles, they truly did want to contribute to the cause in some way. This was the same birthday at which they gave me a purse, so they were batting 1000 that day. Well done!

Before finishing the discussion on fashion, I need to delve into two fashion trends that I embraced in junior high: mini-skirts and elephant bell pants. I’m pretty sure I had to use my own hard-earned cash to buy these items as well. When I think about mini-skirts (and see the photo of me wearing one) I marvel that I was ever able to bend over for any reason at all. I don’t remember being particularly uncomfortable in them, though. Thankfully, no photo exists of me wearing the abominable elephant bell pants. Mini–skirts have returned to the fashion circuit now and again, but the elephant bell appears to have died the death it so richly deserved. I have a story about a perversion of those elephant bell pants that you will find it hard to believe, but I tell you it is true. Someone came up with the idea of cutting those pants off as shorts (hot pants style) and then wearing the cut-off bell part just below the knee while also wearing the shorts. I can tell you are having a hard time envisioning this monstrosity but picture this: you are wearing shorts and your legs are bare from the shorts to the just below the knee, at which point, you are wearing the matching elephant bells attached to your knees with rubber bands. These were called “grasshopper” pants and dear reader, I wore them. In the good and gracious providence of God, that fashion has also never returned. Shudder. But who would have thought that the day would come in which young men would wear their pants with the waist hanging about mid-thigh, thus exposing whatever underwear they are wearing that day. Maybe the grasshopper pants weren’t that bad after all.

This has been Tuesday True Stories with Lynniebeemuseoday. I actually told the story about the paisley bell-bottoms on this blog before, but it bears repeating, doesn’t it?

I’ll probably delete this in the morning while celebrating not being in junior high school again.