Of course, when we're just little kids, sometimes our mothers' questionable tastes are the source of those intense cringes. For example, when I was in the first grade and school-picture taking time rolled around, Mom clipped a big white satin bow embellished with a plastic fake ruby atop my head and sent me off. Being only six years old, I thought it was the height of glamour! Now I look at those photos of me sporting that bow almost as big as my entire head and wonder what in the world we'd been thinking. Of course, it was the style then, a la Shirley Temple.
When I was in the third grade, my much-admired older sister was 16. I thought she was the most amazing person in town. A straight-A student, the town pianist/organist at church, funerals and weddings, seemingly revered by all, she also wore beautiful clothes. Or at least I thought so when I was eight. Sheath skirts were a fashion in 1962 rural southern Indiana. I imagine it was actually a holdover from previous seasons and just late catching on in our little Hoosier neck of the woods. If the skirt was part of a little suit, so much the better. My sister had at least one of these outfits and I'd never seen anything so sophisticated as Lindy in that Jackie Kennedy-esque suit coming home from church! I wanted a sheath skirt so badly I could taste it. Incredibly, after much badgering on my part, my mother found some at a department store in the next town and got them for me. One was navy wool and the other was a lovely gray wool tweed with tiny specks of red and navy in the weave. They were SO GROWN UP! I could not wait to wear one to school. The weekend finally passed, Monday morning dawned and I was up early (so unlike me) and getting dressed in one of the two most thrilling garments I'd ever owned. Wait till my friends got a load of this!
It was about a half a mile from our house to school, and of course, back then most of us walked. I soon found out that this new skirt of mine was not conducive to running, jumping or even a good steady stride. I ended up mincing my way up the street to school and though I felt gorgeous, that skirt was soon a pain in the neck. Recess activities were restricted; couldn't jump rope, climb the monkey bars, run in the relay race or play Red Rover with my friends. I couldn't even really sit comfortably. I continued to occasionally wear the skirts and I really did love them, but as the months wore on, they became relegated exclusively for Sunday school wear. Finally I grew out of them and never clamored for another. Besides, that wool itched miserably.
In fifth grade, some of my female classmates began to develop and a few even wore bras. Beginner bras to be sure; those flat cupped little nothings that were virtually useless. But a BRA nevertheless. I wanted one more than anything! But I was flatter than the proverbial pancake and Mom did not see the necessity. Providentially, my Aunt Sarah had a daughter a few years older than I and a few years younger than my sister. So being, I was the recipient of many of my cousin's hand-me-downs throughout the years. Serendipitously, in the midst of my bra-lust between fifth and sixth grades, Sarah brought over a bag of Janice's clothes one summer weekend. This treasure bag contained TWO outgrown bras of my cousin's. Mom tucked them away in a bottom drawer until such time that they would be needed.
However, the existence of those bras residing in that bottom drawer burned holes in my consciousness. These bras actually had, not just flimsy little flat stretchy panels outlined with lace, but REAL CUPS! As yet, I had nothing to put into those cups. And though I was not allowed to wear them, one Saturday I flouted authority, snuck stealthily into my room, and put one on. I gazed sadly at those poor, deflated, wrinkly cotton cups. Well, there was a remedy. I pulled out a couple pair of my white Buster Brown socks and stuffed them in. Soon I had what I thought was an enviable bust. I slipped my shirt back on and admired my new figure in the mirror. What a shame to waste this glorious vision! I ran outside, hopped on my big, brown Western Auto bike and took off. I rode to the corner and went round and round in circles, wondering if any of the neighbors were looking out their windows and noticing my new physique. This went on at least a good twenty minutes. When no one came outside, mouths gaping in awe at the prepubescent goddess whizzing around the neighborhood, I finally gave up and slunk home, realizing I was a pure deluxe idiot. Besides the realization I was just silly, on one side the socks had migrated to my armpit, so I was lopsided. I was lucky they hadn't fallen out entirely and landed in someone's yard. Bra went back into the bottom drawer, socks back in the sock drawer and I went back to my ten-and-a-half-year-old flatness of being. I ended up never even wearing those bras because by the time I actually needed one, they were too small around the ribs for me. And the cups still too big. My maiden Aunt Mary was the one who ended up kindly taking me to the store and helping me get a couple of properly fitted bras, the entire experience of which was completely humiliating. I expect Mom just didn't want to deal with it.
My next big fashion faux-pas happened in eighth grade. It was the hey-day of Shindig!, Hullaballoo and Nancy Sinatra's hit "These Boots Were Made For Walkin'". Surely, every girl in our class wanted a pair of white go-go boots. And as usual, by the time I talked my parents into it, every shoe store in Knox County, Indiana was sold out of every single white boot. Like the Barbie I missed out on in third grade, I had to take second best, which in this case was a pair of tall black boots that came nearly to my knees. NO ONE wore tall black boots that year; not where I lived anyway. They had to be the short, white ones or they weren't neat-o. Little did I know I was ahead of my time. I could probably wear those same black boots today and they'd still be in style! But, though they were not the 'real thing', aka go-go boots, I wore them anyway, earning the name Boots from the boys in my class. My favorite outfit that year was a knee length, sky blue A-line skirt, a white, ribbed, short sleeve, flower-sprigged sweater called a 'poor-boy', thick, white ribbed tights and those big, black boots. The only thing missing was a newsboy cap or I'd have looked just like Petula Clark or so I thought. I should point out now that I was 13, my previously longed-for but absent breast development leaped into full throttle and in only a matter of a few months, went from an A cup to a C, seemingly in the blink of an eye. So it didn't take long for the boys to go from calling me 'Boots' to 'Boobs' Dollens. Ah, the angst!
High school? I was in high school from '67 to '71. Until I was a senior, girls were not allowed to wear pants to school; so we had closets full of dresses and skirts. Mom would persist in buying me 'old lady dresses'; I would hide in the bedroom, cut the hems off them and re-hem to above the knee. Or else, on the way to school, roll the waistbands of skirts up under my sweaters until the requisite amount of leg was showing. Girls started wearing hose, so finally Mom allowed me to get some, too. I was always behind everyone else with these things. (I had such a heckuva time talking her into letting me shave my legs!)
Hose! Women don't even wear pantyhose anymore, a custom I can't quite get used to. It was considered rather unsanitary not to wear some type of sock or hose; sweating barefooted into our shoes was considered gross. At any rate, hosiery was a bonafide challenge for me. I'd always been a bit on the 'husky' side from age 12 on, but with the advent of high school, I'd gotten downright chubby. Living in a very small town, there were only a couple of stores where you could buy hose. And I'm talking about stockings, not pantyhose. Stockings that you had to hold up via garters. Pantyhose weren't even invented till a couple years later. And there were no 'Queen' sizes; well, if there were, I could never find any--but according to the size charts on the packages, no such thing as X-large sheer stockings existed. So here we have a melange' of obstacles to me wearing stockings:
a) Couldn't find any large enough to fit properly.
b) I had only a long-leg girdle not a garter belt.
c) Skirts lengths were short--this was the era of the mini-skirt after all.
At the advanced age of fourteen, my refusal to wear those childish, white Buster Brown ankle socks (the same kind I stuffed that bra with) impelled me to wear hose that were too small, thus not coming up as high on the thigh as they should have. In addition, my short-hemmed old lady dresses didn't quite cover the tops of said hose nor the bottom of my long-legged girdle. I spent an inordinate amount of time pulling down on my skirts in a desperate effort not to expose my underpinnings to the world. On the positive side, I had wonderfully developed musculature in my hands and forearms from all that tugging. Fortunately, pantyhose were invented a year or so later; the panty part still didn't fit me but I cut the long legs off and wore them hooked to my new short panty length girdle. At last, nothing peeked out from underneath my skirts. Imagine my joy, some years later when plus-size women eventually revolted and spurred clothing manufacturers to offer a wider range of sizes to accommodate all us bigger gals! Yahooo!
A few other sundry thoughts on fashion 'oops' drift through my mind:
- The year I wanted a brown fake fur coat for Christmas and Mom got me a lime-lollipop green one.
- The pleather jumper I wore in 10th grade.
- The suede clogs with 3 inch platforms when I was 18.
- The wooden-soled Dr. Scholl's sandals I wore with bright neon-striped knee-socks in my early twenties.
- The humongously legged elephant bell pants that kept tripping me when I walked.
- The gossamer thin, baby blue sweater my ex mother-in-law made for me on giant knitting needles, but I didn't have enough sense enough to wear a camisole underneath when I wore it to work.
- Tube tops. Enough said.
There are so many more but this article is getting long! By the time I reached my mid-thirties, I realized I'd exercised some truly bad judgement in clothing choices throughout my life. Resolving to never repeat such bad decisions, I read a couple of books and many fashion magazine articles on what not to wear, how to construct a basic wardrobe and how to change things up with various jackets, blouses, or jewelry. In the mid-eighties, I became a devotee of Donna Karan's easy jersey separates which I thought were nothing short of genius. Of course, I could never afford real Karan but knock-offs were easy to find. I still like that whole concept very much, but find my taste is now running to the vaguely bohemian. Besides, now I'm retired, so you usually just find me in jeans as I have little use for such a thing as dress pants these days. And I haven't worn a dress or skirt in ages.
I hope you enjoyed strolling through my past with me as I recalled these horrendous errors of judgement. What was your biggest fashion faux-pas? I'd love to hear about them in the comments!
Till next time,
Fashion faux pas should be celebrated. I enjoy them because it means we're not all clones.
~Linda Evangelista
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