STUFF
ByI feel as though I have lost some dear friends.
The Current wife has attacked my closet and banished some of my best pals. It started when she said, “Let’s straighten out your stupid closet.” We stood there, looking in as she shook her head. “You have stuff in here that you haven’t worn in more than a year,” she said. To be honest, there was stuff in there I haven’t worn since most of us thought that The Beatles were bugs. I spotted a shirt that I wore at the Democratic convention that nominated John F. Kennedy.
“Take all your winter shirts and put them over there,” she ordered, pointing my bed. “Then put all your summer shirts over here. Hang the jackets on the back of the door, and put your pants over there on the chest.”
“Are we just going to organize them, so I don’t have to call you to help me find some pants?” I asked.
“No. We’re getting rid of about half this junk,” she announced.
Once we had everything separated she started holding up articles of clothing.
”You haven’t worn this shirt since we moved to Montana. Out it goes!” She shoved it into as big plastic bag. “This shirt looks like it’s been inhabited by rodents. Out!” She snatched up a shirt that was the color of elderly mud “Out!” She went through my shirts like a human vacumn cleaner, filling that bag while I choked back tears. “You can keep this one. I bought it for you.” Then, ”I’ve always liked that blue shirt too. You can keep it.” I had never counted my shirts, but there must have been thirty of them in there. There were a few that must have belonged to total strangers, because I had no memory of ever seeing them before.
All in all it was sad. I became attached to some of those pants. As she stuffed one pair into that yawning bag I felt as though I should give them a hug. They were the pants I wore to the hospital on that day our first daughter was born, 56 years ago. She grabbed another pair of pants — the ones I wore to New York for Jimmy Carter’s nomination. Next she de-hangered a pair I had worn at least once a week for two decades. Sure, they sagged a wee bit in the seat, and the cuffs looked as though they had been attacked by a snarling, rabid Taliban, but they contained memories. I wanted to kiss them goodbye.
Finally, ‘way at the back of the closet, we found a hanger that contained a half-dozen ties. I personally, and happily, threw them all into the bag. I have always hated ties, and haven’t worn once since a funeral in 1972 — an have no intention of ever attending another funeral, so I had no tender feelings for the ties. I think ties for men, and high-heeled shoes for women, are the two dumbest mistakes ever created by the fashion geeks.
My closet isn’t one of those nice big walk-in things. It stretches about three feet to the right, and three feet to the left. There’s one metal pole that runs the length and it had held up all those clothes for many years. Now it looked kind of naked. I had a few summer shirts to hang up, and a few winter shirts. My new supply of pants covered only a few inches now.
Maybe it’s time to go shopping.
Cleaning out a closet is the closest most of us mere mortals come to an archeological dig. Many of us CWs just quietly make husband’s clothes disappear, kind of like working for the Mafia, because getting rid of a shirt, over 30 years old and looking twice that age, can be so hard on you fellows. Have a great shopping trip. Now that’s a subject for another blog: the difference in the way men and women shop!
This story made me fondly remember my mother who passed away last January. My mom had this habit throughout my life of bagging things up for dad and me. She’d get tired of looking at something we had left out so she’d grab her good old plastic garbage bag and toss the items inside. Then she would tie the top in a complete knot and tag it, “Paula’s stuff.” That was her catch phrase. Sometimes she would would add the location where the items had been, i.e. “Paula’s stuff from her room.” That was even more helpful. Usually dad and I wouldn’t realize the bagged items were missing initially until we needed them. We’d start thinking, “Where is my winter coat?” or “What happened to those shoes I wore last spring?” We’d ask mom and she’d say she bagged them up for us. Those words always made us cringe, for we knew the next step in the hunt for our item would bring us to the closet filled with 20 or so plastic bags that were definitely NOT see through, tied tightly, and carefully labeled, “Paula’s stuff.”
Bill — another GEM!!!
It seems though, that wives feel free to go through husband’s closets and subtract things, but in their closets, they only add. “I got this thing on sale, and with all the money I saved, I got this other thing, also on sale, and with all the money etc., etc., etc.,” will you get the picture. That is why my wife has every closet in the house filled with her stuff, and I have a little bitty 3 foot space for all of my stuff. Great article Bill, and Karen is right, you need to do an article on the difference between men and women’s shopping techniques.
What a wonderful article Bill. I was touched by those tender moments as you said goodbye to your old friends, but really you have a 56 years old pair of pants? That fact alone wd have made me want to keep that.
Well, this week i’ve been thinking thinking i need to clear out some of tom’s clothes and stuff in his closet and most of them still have tags from my shopping trips, a couple of weeks ago. Even though i picked the clothes out and liked it when i bought it and still like it when i am considering getting rid of things in tom’s closet, i never had any attachment to HIS stuff. Tee hee. Now, my stuff that’s a different story. There’s “that’s the shirt my mom got for me,” even if it is out of style it’s still important to me. I guess i do get attached to some things in our closet/home bc it was given to me by people who i love truly and dearly. As for the rest, i don’t care.
For Gene, you know, all this shopping things and getting them on sale and saving money, we do for dear darling husband bc if we were just thinking of us, we wd buy things bc we love them and not even bother looking at the tag. After all we have this magic plastic and we know the incantation, “put it on this card,” and than magically and obediently the sales clerk, with a smile, puts our treasure in a bag and sends us off with a smile. And it works every time!!! As for us needing to add to our closet, well, those are things we do for love. We expend our energy and assume the task of shopping just so WE CAN LOOK GOOD FOR YOU and we don’t even complain about that. And about clearing our your closet, well, that’s just a labor of love and all women have that in their genes and that’s one way we show you that we love you.
For Betsey, wow, how cool that you get Bill to participate and cooperate in the process. It’s a solitary act for me; i add things to tom’s closet and remove them and he never noticed the stuff i take away. And it’s so much faster and painless for both of us.
Oh, yes, i would like to get credit for being green. First, i use greenbacks so that makes me green. JK. Second, when my nieces come over to visit at some point they will say, can i check to see what new things you got and that usually end up with, “i love this top and it’s my size, too. Can i borrow this? Borrow items are borrowed in perpetuity and since it leaves my closet and gets “re” used by someone else, i claim credit for recycling and being green. And this practice is also known by my girls as “shopping at co thu’s house.” it’s a good thing i love them more than i love my things.
I am with Mom and the MG on differences when we shop. I often time “shoot and bag” when i shop meaning i will look for what i am looking for and if i dont see it i am done. If i see something i like then i eyeball it for size and bag it and if it doesn’t fit it goes in the pile for “career closets,” or to my nieces since we can share clothes. Tom on the other hand hates to shop unless it’s for technology stuff and i refuse to go with tom to buy technology stuff. Just shoot it and bag it bc i don’t care what the chip in that phone/computer, etc can do; unless it can do laundry, dishes, iron, clean house, water our plants, cook; it’s not important to me. Not to sound like i am complaining, we do have help so i don’t have to do those things, mostly. But still, being a wife is a lot of work and i for one will only do it for LOVE.
Now, i suppose i should go and clear tom’s closet?!!! Wink, wink, wink.
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