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By SARAH SMILEY
Old Clothes And A Bright Future
There’s only one thing worse than the thought of trying on old clothes you wore 10 years and 20 pounds ago: That’s actually trying on the old clothes you wore 10 years and 20 pounds ago.My closet is filled with every size from two to 14, thanks to my previous stages of pregnancy, postpartum, youth and motherhood (not necessarily in that order). I’m not dumb; I know I will never fit into a size two again. Yet I hang on to a dozen dresses that look like they could fit a large cat, because it gives me a sick feeling of happiness to see them and realize that I once wore those tiny dresses, some of them even while I was six-months pregnant with my first child.
I hang on to the larger dresses for the same reason – that I’m not dumb. I know I probably never will wear them again. But I never try on any dress from either end of the spectrum.
The pharmaceutical companies haven’t produced enough Xanax to get me into the dress I wore on the first date with my husband. It is emotionally damaging enough just to see the dress with its telling layer of dust on the shoulders. I can hold the dress up by its hanger and actually feel the way the darts on the bust would reduce my chest to one big uni-boob, and the A-line skirt would look more like an A with an apple stuck inside of it.
No, I don’t want to try these dresses on. I just want to know they are there.
Last week, when Dustin and I were cleaning out our closet, getting our house ready to sell in preparation for our transfer to
“You’re not keeping those, are you?” I said.
“What, you don’t think they’ll fit me?” he asked.
It is true that Dustin’s body has changed significantly less than mine in the 10 years we have been married. He has not, after all, had an eight-pound human being inside him. Nonetheless, I knew that his old white uniform pants wouldn’t fit him anymore than my wedding dress would still fit me.
“No, I don’t think they will fit you,” I said. “Put them in the giveaway pile.”
“Giveaway? These aren’t giveaways,” he said. “I always need uniform pants.”
“You need uniform pants that fit.”
“Well, I think these will fit just fine,” Dustin said, and he started unbuckling his pants.
I realized then that males apparently are not equipped with the same sense that women have for judging how many seams they will bust when they attempt to put on old clothes.
Dustin, God love him, really thought he could fit into those pants. Once he squeezed himself into them, however, the fabric was so taught, the hems drew up to about five inches above his ankles. His rear end was flattened like a pancake, and his stomach was pushed out of the waistband, like toothpaste coming out of the tube.
He looked like a fat Elvis.
“See, they fit great,” Dustin said.
Oh, but it gets worse. He continued to try on old uniform pants, including ones that were the same size as the first unsuccessful pair. Each time, he thought he looked great.
Then we found a photo album from the time when we were dating. We were shocked at how young we looked. The kids heard us laughing and came to see.
“Look at Dad,” they howled, pointing at the pictures. “He was so skinny! And look at all the hair he had!”
I reached over and squeezed Dustin’s shoulder. “We’ve changed a lot,” I said, “but I think I like us better now.”
He agreed.
The next day, Dustin put all of his old uniform pants in a bag and took them to work to give away. He was braver than me to try on his old clothes and even more brave to take them to his peers and admit they don’t fit.
But he did make one mistake: He gave away all his old clothes and didn’t save one to hang in the back of the closet. You know what that means. Now his medium pants will become the smallest items in his closet, and because those fit even just a little, he’ll always think he can have another slice of pie and a second helping of spaghetti. And then someday, those pants won’t fit him either.
Just as you might leave one dead ant on the floor as a warning for all his ant friends, you always leave at least one piece of thin clothes in your closet.
But you never ever try it on.
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Sarah Smiley is the wife of a Navy pilot and daughter of a retired Navy pilot. She is the author of “Going Overboard: The Misadventures of a Military Wife” (Penguin/NAL), and her syndicated column “Shore Duty” appears weekly in military and civilian newspapers across the country. Read more about Sarah at her website, www.sarahsmiley.com.