Tuesday, May 22, 2007

All My Clothes Are Fat Clothes

One of those funny emails making the rounds says, "Things only women understand." Things like, "crying can be fun," and "fat clothes."

Who of my readers can understand this? All my clothes are fat clothes!!

Fat clothes-- those forgiving, figure-concealing larger-than-usual garments that as Peg Bracken put it (or was it Jean Kerr?) "protect the community from the spectacle of our bulky contours." They have no waistline, they're comfy, you wear them on days when you can't fit into anything else.

Then comes the day when even your fat clothes don't fit! The day you have to buy the raincoat in a larger size, the day when your bathrobe is too tight.

You even spill out of your rings and your shoes. God forbid it should happen to you. But if you want a future as an older woman, you have to get used to wearing larger size clothes. Unless you are one of those "birds" (as in horses, birds, and muffins--I forget who coined that one).

The day your fat clothes get too tight used to be the day you would start a new diet. (See earlier blog, "Pru's Diet Book.")
Now, though, I tend to skip that stage of things and go straight to the point where my fat clothes become my thin clothes and I buy new fat clothes. So maybe it would be more accurate to say, "All my clothes started out as fat clothes."

Eventually the old fat clothes will follow the parade to the back of the closet and then finally, ten years after they last fit, out the door to the Salvation Army. But as I write dear reader, I'm wearing my fat pants, black ones from LLBean. They are size "Large-Petite," and I'm happy to say I need a new pair in the same size. These are worn out which is good because I can't fit into any of my painting clothes any more.

As my daughter Winifred says, "It's never over."

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