Did you have a few special pieces of clothing growing up? You know, items that you loved so much you wore them to bits? Maybe you or a nostalgic parent kept an item or two packed away someplace for old time's sake. Have you ever thrown something precious out or given it away only to have such regret later that you don't know how to process that loss? Well, the clothes are long gone but the memories remain.
Before I knew anything about designer labels, I had a few favorite items of clothing in my childhood wardrobe, and by wardrobe I mean a two-doored light yellow painted piece of wooden bedroom furniture in which I hung clothes and lined up my slippers, boots, sneakers and shoes pair by neat and tidy pair. (It did not lead to Narnia...just sayin'.)
I was a super lucky kid. My mother made a lot of my clothing when I was small and although I outgrew things pretty rapidly from year to year, I had quite a few items that I cherished. Regrettably, I don't know what happened to them.
If you're like me, you wish you had those treasured frocks today, if only to run your middle aged hands over their textures and picture yourself as the little pip whom they once fit perfectly.
One favorite item of mine was a red calico quilted jacket with a close-cut hood and chunky brown wooden toggle closures. Toggles were new to me (I'm guessing from pictures that I was 6 when this was my autumn overcoat) and I remember trying valiantly in a mirror to steady the little red loop and work the toggle through it; but reflections make things appear backward and my fingers were too tiny and impatient to manage the task. I remember loving the color of the coat and the softness of the hood against my head and face but I think what I liked most was that someone needed to rescue me from it when I was captively buttoned. I'd stand at attention while Mom's gentle hands freed me, basking in the warmth of being babied, just a little, during an age when I was a "big girl", more than accustomed to dressing and undressing myself.
Another favorite item was my one piece terrycloth short romper that was held perfectly snug across my flat eight year old body with a thick piece of elastic, like a soft blue hug. It took no more than thirty seconds to slide it on, grab my rubber flip flops and skip out back to our sundappled yard on a hot summer day, where I could find shade under a tree with my Barbie and her swimming pool, the water heated to a pleasant-for-fashiondolls temperature while I picked pine needles and scooped dirt out of its placid blueness so that Barbie's blonde hair didn't get grody.
Mom didn't sew my denim gauchos with the matching vest or my cream colored gauzy western shirt festooned with sepia brown thunderbird appliques on the shoulders or the oxblood leather knee high zip up boots with the crepe soles and funky braids down the sides that made me feel so grown up, but those were all favorites too.
It's so easy now to just press enter and order outfits and I, for one, admit to doing that far too often. Lately, though, standing in front of my closet and grabbing the same old combination of raggedy, patched jeans and a long sleeved tshirt, I'm beginning to feel very strongly that less is more. Maybe it's because I'm middle aged and loathe anything that requires a lot of fuss, or maybe it's because I returned mostly to simple black, blue, grey and white basics a few years ago; but when you have just a few standards, some reliable go-tos, and a single closet of predictable well made items and you really love each one, less clothing actually is more enjoyable. If they have a story behind them (like the jeans you wore when you saw a certain concert or the leather jacket your husband bought you for your 20th anniversary) even better.
I just wish, for old time's sake, that I had one more piece made by my Mom with love...maybe something where I'd need her kind and careful assistance when it comes to the buttons, just so I can feel like her baby again.
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