Kathleen McCall:
Occasional�� Muse�

2001-09-28 - 10:01 a.m.

Demonic Clothing

I'm trying to figure out what on earth to wear this morning, because yes, the washer is still not fixed, plus the weather here has been its usual seasonophrenic "HA! Gotcha!" type thing. And I was looking at various seldom-worn items, and thinking I have some evil stuff in that closet. I do.

For example, I have one pair of pants - and I know they are not the only ones - that simply make - me- feel - dumpy. There you have it. That's what they do. Dumpy frumpy pants. You wouldn't know it to look at them on the hanger, but I know if I put them on and go out in them, I will start to hear this barely-there voice - you know, the one the kids use sometimes, to say things to each other they want to be able to deny - "Dumpy as....dumpy ass...last ten pounds is at half-mast..."

If I whip them off and look at them closely - trying to figure out what it IS about this pair, why these pants, they look much the same as any other pair I own, or wouldown, why would these pants make me feel dumpy? "Hey, I heard you say that, about my ass. You shut up with that stuff!" "Did not." "Did TOO! I heard you!" "Well, a woman who talks to her trousers probably hears a LOT of imaginary stuff."

So I think maybe it IS me, and not the pants - after all, no one else has ever confessed to me that they were taunted by their slacks - I hang them back up, thinking there will be a better day for this perfectly good pair of pants. And as I slide the closet door shut, I hear a quiet, "Fat-ass."

And yesterday, I wore a shirt. The shirt was twisted. Literally twisted. It looked fine before I put it on. It was probably bought at my favorite Le Mart Du Wal, and the pattern wasn't straight on the fabric when those six-year-olds cut out the pattern, and so it rides up on one side, and the neck gaps, and I pulled at it all day thinking it was my anatomy when it was really just another item possessed by something from the Bureau of Evil Clothing Spirits.

So what did I do with the cheap twisted shirt? Are you guessing? Hint: this is the woman who grabs a pen from the jar, scribbles for two minutes on the back of the checkbook, gets disgusted, and PUTS THE PEN BACK IN THE JAR before selecting another one. Yes, I put the shirt in the hamper, so I can wash it and put it away and wear it again, probably to a job interview where the interviewer will spend twenty minutes wondering exactly what kind of clothing-adjustment tic I have, which will put me right out of the running for that receptionist's job.

I'm not so sure what I ought to do with this stuff anyway. It hardly seems fair to give my droop-butt pants and my aging-frump cardigans and freak-of-nature shirts to Goodwill. Poor people have enough problems. I know; I am one, and I can tell you that if you are wearing droop-butt pants when they bounce your ATM card, it really shoots the shit out of your day. So I can't wish them on the poverty-stricken. I suppose I could cut them up and make a quilt with them. I wish I were confident that Evil Bureau Spirits wouldn't simply multiply like worm segments, and I wouldn't be twitching and yanking at the covers all night, dreaming fitfully of flattened chests and butts that spank the back of your knees.

I do have some wonderful clothing. I have clothing so soft and so perfect that putting it on feels like being slid into melted chocolate. The Bureau Demons haven't gotten this stuff yet. Problem is, it's all in the pj drawer. Apparently they haven't made it over to that side of the bedroom.

It's coming. It's coming. I can see it now. I will be the wild-haired woman behind you in the grocery line, muttering, and if you ask me why I wear pajamas to the grocery, I will tell you, "My pants told me to."

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