It Can Take a Village to Purchase a Party Dress
My friends and family know that I’ve never been much of a girly girl. When I was a kid, I preferred trucks to dolls, and roughhousing and playing sports with boys to tea parties with girls. While my little sister wore frilly socks and seven petticoats, my favorite outfit was a pair of corduroy overalls. I fell on my face so many times from harebrained stunts (like trying to teach myself to tightrope walk on a slack piece of rope I rigged up), I ended up having my two front teeth pulled early so that I wouldn’t damage my permanent teeth when they came in. My face was usually a cheerful mixture of yellow, blue, purple, and green from bruises in various stages of healing.
As an adult, I guess I haven’t changed all that much. Two of my most cherished possessions are a gold-colored Skil saw I bought during the company’s fifty-year anniversary, and my twenty-eight-year-old nail belt. I don’t think they make nail belts that small any more, so I’m taking very good care of it. I can’t stand to wear makeup, I’ve never gravitated toward young children (although, for some ironic reason that attests to the mischievousness of the Cosmos, they love me! Go figure.) and I’m with Sue Grafton’s PI Kinsey Milhone when it comes to high heels: “If high heels were so wonderful, men would be wearing them.” Yeah. And they’re not.
At the same time, I still have two X chromosomes and a healthy dose of femininity that comes with them. So, even though I didn’t like getting dressed up when I was a girl, I do now that I’m grown up. As long as no one makes me wear high heels. And I love clothes and shopping for them. Over the weekend, Richard and I were in Ashland, Oregon doing our Christmas shopping. And because my birthday falls in the month of December, that’s usually when I pick out my birthday present, too.
I was at my favorite boutique looking for something to wear for the party season when I spotted this gorgeous gown with a fitted black velvet bodice and a sumptuous, floor-length, silver taffeta skirt. It reminded me of something that Cinderella would have worn to the Prince’s ball, and even though it was too formal for what I was looking for, I couldn’t resist trying it on. Big mistake. It fit perfectly. Damn!
Richard was waiting for me in the chair that the ladies who run the store had thoughtfully installed for the partners of their customers. He was happily pecking away on his new iPhone while I tried on my selections. But it was at the other end of the shop from the dressing rooms. So, in order to show him the dress, I had to traverse the entire length of the store. It was filled with women, and when I came out of the dressing room, feeling self-conscious, everyone turned and looked at me. I ducked my head and lowered my eyes, hoping, belatedly, to become invisible, but it didn’t work. “Oh!” exclaimed one nice woman; “that fits you perfectly!” “It’s true!” said another. “You look beautiful!”
“Thanks,” I said, blushing. “Thanks.”
“Where do you plan to wear it?” asked the saleswoman who had helped me.
“Well, maybe a party,” I said.
“Hey, if I looked that good in a dress, I’d buy it just to wear around the house!” declared a shopper, giggling.
They were all so sweet and cute, these ladies. I finally made it to Richard and he looked over the dress. “It’s beautiful,” he said. “And you look beautiful.”
“Thanks,” I smiled.
“But isn’t it a little too formal? Where do you plan to wear it?”
“A party?” I said.
“Hmm,” he replied. “It’s really kind of formal for the kinds of parties we go to.”
“Yeah,” I said. He was right.
“But it’s up to you. It looks great on you.”
Well, but he was right. It was too formal. I wasn’t really sure where I would wear it. So I went back to the dressing room and picked out a cute pair of pants and a nice top and took them to the cash register. Everyone in the store craned their head to see if I was buying the dress, and when they saw I wasn’t, they all bit their lips.
I fetched Richard and as we were heading out the door, one of the women who had complimented me earlier was exiting at the same time. She asked me if I had bought the dress.
“No,” I said. “It’s too formal.”
“Well,” she said, “I really think you should reconsider. A dress that beautiful that looks that good on you … I mean, even if you only wear it once, it would be worth it.”
I sighed. “Yeah.”
We left the store. We went a few steps. “Otter,” I said, using his nickname, “I think maybe I should buy that dress. I don’t know where I’ll wear it, but something might come up. When I do need something formal, I never have anything. And that dress is a classic.”
“Well then, go for it,” he said, giving me a kiss. “It’s your birthday.”
So I went back and told the saleswoman that I was buying the dress after all. She brightened and rushed to get it for me. As her partner was ringing me up, she said, “I was thinking earlier, ‘What a foolish woman.’” She shook her head at my narrowly averted folly. “You made the right decision.”
Another shopper saw what was transpiring and said, “Oh! You’re getting it? I’m so happy for you!’
Glancing around, I saw that everyone in the store was smiling at me and congratulating me. Geez, I never would have imagined that I could make so many people so happy by buying something for myself!
So, yeah, it’s fun being a tomboy. But it’s fun being a girly girl sometimes, too. Especially when surrounded by such lovely women as were in that store. And every time I wear this dress—whenever and wherever that might be—I’ll think about them and all their sweet supportiveness and generous happiness for me.
Above, against my better judgment, inviting inevitable thoughts of, “It doesn’t fit that great,” and “It’s not that beautiful,” is a picture of The Dress—bowing to peer pressure after Richard made some comment about posting this blog entry without it. Something like, “Chickenshit.” Or something ;)
Sunday, November 30, 2008