I grew up in a house where there were distinct differences between the clothes you wore outside the house and those reserved for indoors only. Even then, there were clothes for getting dirty in outside, and then others for a picnic at the park. I’ll bet you can tell my grandmother was involved. She was very strict in matters of appearance, which created many mother/daughter disagreements between us.
Twenty years later, we have all relaxed to a much more casual approach even, yes, I’ve seen it, owning her own pair of jeans! We have spanned decades of fads and fashion, gleaming the timeless, and trashing the terribly fun. Grandma and I are not the only ones to do it, it has been a cultural phenomena.
Grandma didn’t wake up one day and decide to be a sharp dresser. She conformed to the heels and pearls of the American 50’s, dragging her off-spring the the trenches of cultural change, maintaining her own style in the face of a few extremes. (She’s one of the few people I see pictures of from the 1980’s who looks good even by today’s standards!) She evolved from skirts and dresses only, to actually wearing shorts in the garden, but she still changed from house clothes to outing clothes if she were going to run up to the store.
Although I have gleaned my own fashion depreciation from her, I too enjoy glamming up on occasion. I feel fortunate to live in a time when pretty much anything goes in your expression through costuming. I can be Goth or Girly, and though it may draw attention, I won’t make the media for unconventional clothing. Because I have also developed pain issues with sensitivity toward clothing, I tend to be much more casual in my choices than I should be.
I don’t know that it would bother me so much except for two specific things: baggy britches, and this site with “funny pictures from Wal-mart”. I am exceptionally critical of baggy britches. There are some fashions I think are completely ridiculous, like tube socks with heels, but I have never considered myself a Fashionista. Pretty much if you think you look good, I can think you look like a moron, and we can both be quite content. Normally I don’t feel the need to comment on what others are wearing. (Unless I am at a fancy to-do with a gay man, and then I can’t help myself, though I DO make it a point to be discreet. It’s wrong to hurt another person’s feelings for your own entertainment. I’m only human so I try to compromise on those rare and ridiculous occasions.)
The baggy jeans, however, are something I can’t seem to help commenting on. It’s not the glimpse of boxers (or thongs), or even more rolls than are commonly acceptable. I totally understanding wanting to have room to breath within your own clothes, but there is a certain point at which it goes too far. If you are required to hold on to your pants in order to walk, you look like a moron to more than just me. In fact, you are a walking hazard even more so than the Stiletto walkers. Some people can’t afford proper fitting clothes; I understand that, and for others they might just be proud of the fact that they lost all that weight after working so hard. I try really hard to give them the benefit of the doubt, but it doesn’t always work.
Let me explain something about those baggy pants. They are an indication that you are prepared to put out. Most people by now know that it started in prison, but it goes well beyond that. Like a woman going bra-less in a see through shirt, you are advertising your willingness to be a slut. Maybe that’s not actually the case, but that is the message you give. Not everyone looks at people in obviously in-appropriate clothing and comes up with generous excuses based on their own un-acceptable choices.
Which is what gets me so bad about this website. More often than not, when I do manage to go into a store, I am not at all suitably attired. I go out in pajamas more often than I want to admit and, even though I may stay in the car most of the time, it is inappropriate. I feel fortunate just to be able to be out and about. I don’t do out and about because people tend to be cruel and selfish. You know, like the people who feel the need to take and then comment of these pictures from Wal-mart.
It’s not that I think the individuals making the comments intend to be cruel and selfish. They don’t know those people so they can’t be hurting anyone, right? Wrong! It’s enough to make me ashamed of my quiet criticisms of the well dressed. I have tried to avoid these postings because of how uncomfortable it makes me. I have eyes. I can see how inappropriate these people are, or simply how uncaring they have become of their appearance in the moment. I get upset about people walking around the store in their pajama’s too, but it’s not like I haven’t done it.
So maybe that’s the point. We all have opinions; we will not have the same values in the appearances of others. We have all worn or done something in public that is completely inappropriate. Do you really feel it necessary to make fun of individuals who have no clue they have been photographed? Really?
Every single thing we do or say is subject to criticism. There are individuals in the world who feel deeply these criticisms, even those placed upon others, because of their own understanding of personal short comings. Based on the unkindness of some usually very kind people, I have no desire to be seen in public ever again. Before today, I simply had concerns that those other selfish individuals were simply going to be rude and restore my belief that the people of this world are not worthy of my gentle spirit. Today I know they are not.
