Sunday, July 4, 2010

Over the Hill and frumpy, but comfy

I think I have reached the summit of The Hill. How do I know? It's the jeans.

Every night I come home from work and immediately strip off my jeans with their annoying zippers and buttons and seams and nagging waistbands. And I slip on slacks made of stretchy elastic stuff. No zipper. No button. Sometimes I go all out and just grab some sloppy, but oh-so-comfy sweatpants.

All my life I've noticed the little old ladies wearing their stretch slacks and thought, "that's when I'll know I'm old, when I start wearing stretchy, frumpy clothes rather than trendy clothes." Well, to be truthful, I've never been trendy, I'm always 3 or 4 steps behind fashion-wise, but there is a part of me that always believed I'd never give up my blue jeans - the rebellious flag of my youth.

Here's the truth about blue jeans. As much as I love them, as much as I feel they reflect who I am (child of the sixties and seventies, counter-culture, hippie-wannabe, even though everybody wears blue jeans, I'll bet even Rush Limbaugh wears blue jeans), blue jeans have those really uncomfortable thick seams that go up the legs, and down the center of the seat. And lately the waistbands always feel too tight (because my waist is getting too thick, I know, I know). They're just not comfortable. And in cold weather, blue jeans are cold, they absorb the chill and then slap my skin with it. And in hot weather they don't breathe. I, who love hot weather, cannot stand to wear blue jeans on a hot, sticky Iowa summer day. And I cannot take a nap in blue jeans, because of the tight waistband, thick, uncomfortable seam thing. And when you're at the summit of The Hill, you never know when you might need a nap, and you've got to be prepared in comfy pajama-like trousers.

So at the end of a work day, I peel the blue jeans off and slide my aging, thickening body into the bliss of stretch pants. So I am at the top of that proverbial hill, just at the top, not over it yet, not quite yet.

I'll know when I'm over the hill when I opt out of blue jeans for work wear, and start coming to work in stretch slacks.

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