Filed under: Parenting
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Filed under: Middle Age, Parenting | Tags: clothing, humor, Mammary Jack in the Box, Middle-Age, muffin top, Plato's Closet, southern, tank tops
There’s something about hitting your forties that stirs up a civil war inside your psyche, or at least it did for me. Part of me (a large part) is vain. I still strive to keep the muffin top from lopping completely over my waistband, I hide the gray streaks under a veneer of bleach, and I apply ridiculously over-priced creams to a face that I like to tell my kids shows “I had a fun life.” I go to the gym and flail around on the “I-limp-and-drool” every other day. I even have a pill tray so I can keep track of my vitamins, glucosamine, calcium and allergy meds. At least I’m not on the cholesterol/diabetes/heart medicine train just yet. And, for the most part, I’m pretty happy with how I look.
But I’m beginning to have some setbacks.
At the beginning of the summer I took my daughters to a consignment store called Plato’s Closet. This store is great, stocking name brand clothes for teenagers (and those hopeful they might still be able to wear them) at deeply discounted prices. In fact, I have gotten a few J.Crew and Banana Republic shirts there myself. This time, however, I made a grave mistake. I tried on the tank tops.
While my daughters flipped patiently among the racks, I snuck to the back of the store and spied several cute tank tops that weren’t too young, or too slutty, or splattered with Aeropostale across the front. With a gleam in my eye and a prance in my comfortable mom-approved New Balance sneakers, I dove into the changing room to try them on.
Guess what? They didn’t fit.
Shocker.
Apparently, the makers of teen-age tank tops long ago realized something I had not: Teen-age boobs are not located in the same place on your body as “I’ve had two kids” boobs. In fact, there is anywhere from a half-inch to a THREE-inch difference!
So, still innocent of this bitter pill I would soon have to swallow (right after I choke down another calcium pill because you have to take them three times a day), I tried pulling the tank tops down, only to have them ride up again until they looked like some awkward, Victorian-cut nightie. My boobs were happily bouncing beneath the seam, making me look like a dog who’s had a few too many puppies. So I tried another one that looked more forgiving. With a vague feeling of desperation I made one last try. I took each boob in hand and tried to tuck it into the empty space in the shirt where they should rest. They looked great until I moved, then out popped each one, like a crazy mammary Jack-in-the-Box.
And don’t get me started on the jeans! Thankfully I had sense enough to know they were never gonna fit my forty-year-old ass. I mean, look at how they fit on the teenagers. Low-rise waists can’t hide their hormone-in-the-chicken-and-milk muffin tops, and they certainly didn’t make the tramp stamp folded in half on their lower backs look any better, although I have to admit there is something mildly entertaining about trying to figure out what the stamp actually is when you can only see half of it. Half a butterfly or angel looks a lot like a “W”, which I assume stands for WIDE–hey, if the tattoo fits… Anyway, if fourteen-year-old girls can’t wear those jeans and look good, you know an ass that’s sunk two inches and flattened like a pancake isn’t going to fit.
But I took heart in knowing that:
a) Pretty soon I’ll be like my older brother and will just give up entirely (he admits this–this is not intended as an insult!). Then he won’t be able to make jokes about my not knowing what color my hair actually is.
b) I will never have to worry about whether I have on my good undies (you know, the ones where the elastic waistband is still covered by cotton) when I wear my mom-waisted jeans, and
c) I can afford to buy the good bras and Spanx that put everything (temporarily) where it should be. Deal with that, Teenagers Who Still Have To Bum Money Off Your Parents! I may not have your bodies, but I only have a few more years to fight the good fight. You’re just entering the ring.
Filed under: Parenting | Tags: Cotillion, Dancing, humor, south, southern, teenagers
Could someone please explain to me why the ritual of sending Southern “tweens” on the cusp of womanhood to Cotillion still exists? Don’t get me wrong. Daughter #2 is doing it, albeit under protest. And like her fellow future debutantes (in this case, girls who will someday go to college like we did, drink the same swill and do just as many walk-of-shames as we did, and then come live at home), she will be wearing the requisite white gloves, appropriately-cut dress somewhere close to her knees, and an old wrap of mine because let’s face it–every teenager wants to look like their Great Aunt Elspeth.
Now, as I understand it, Cotillion began as a country dance in France in the 1800s, which enabled partners to flirt and socialize as they danced. So here we are, 200 years later, attempting to provide our children with the opportunity to socialize. As if school, FaceBook, Twitter, InstaGram and the four others they think I don’t know anything about, aren’t enough. Flirting and socializing? Have these people ever been to a dance these days? I’ve seen less bumping and grinding in the final two laps of a NASCAR race. I think we’re WAY beyond flirting. (Of course, my Sweet Angel would never do such a thing).
Also, according to tradition, the higher the social status, the more elegant the event used to be. Social status? Let’s see…how to address that one. Since we are, to quote comedian Louis CK, “in a suburb of Walmart,” I’m not sure how much elegance we can truly hope to have. White gloves will only cover up so many Sally Hansen nails and dirt accumulated in barns and soccer/field hockey/lacrosse dirt. And there’s also no hiding the multiple ear piercings and happy faces drawn all over their arms in pen by their friends.
Nor can we disguise the difference in attitude from our Delicate Flowers’ ancestors. Daughter #2, who is twelve years old, 5’6” and 100 pounds wet, got matched up with the shortest boy there. Of course. Short Boy’s friends, other twelve-year-old Future Fraternity Bothers practicing for pledge week, teased Short Boy, saying, “You’re so much shorter than she is!” (Duh!) Daughter #2, a delicate southern flower for sure, flipped her hair and tossed back to them, “You’re so much more annoying than he is!”
That’s my girl! Yep, the gloves are coming off.
Of course, the dresses have rules too. For example, nothing strapless, and they must come just above the knee. I would like to know, have any of the women who organize this thing ever tried to shop for dresses for a tween? The dresses available that aren’t from Lilli Pulitzer, Nordstrom or straight out of the Preppy Handbook (remember that?) look like clothing for hookers, pirates or hippies circa 1972. No spaghetti straps? Knee-length? Really? Well, I guess we better head on over to Pennsylvania and borrow some dresses from the Amish. Maybe those girls who “Broke Amish” won’t need them.
There are a couple of bright spots: on the nights you don’t have to drive, there are two or three hours of blissful peace and quiet after the Bath and Body Works brothel fog has evaporated. And, if you are the driver that night, you will probably learn an enormous amount of information (you are, however, supposed to report back to the other moms what was said), like whose kid had sweaty palms, whose kid smelled weird, and which girls managed to arrange to dance with their “boyfriends.” The flip side? Who gets to be the lucky one to tell Sally’s mom that Sally and John were seen kissing at school? Or that little Jenny put raccoon rings of eyeliner on as soon as she left the house?
On the night I have to drive, I plan on dropping off the girls, hiding out in the closest StarBucks, and turning the radio up REALLY loud on the way home.
In sweat pants.
Subourbon Mom 