7 December 2014

Desperation Pants


For years I was a waitress. While serving drinks paid my tuition and bought me some plane tickets, it also gave me a life-long distaste for black pants, especially the kind I'd been forced to wear as part of a uniform.

Black pants may be staple in every girl’s wardrobe,  but I loathe them. The last time I wore black pants to a party, someone confused me with the caterer. So I’ve sworn off of them for good.

Sad, & lonely, & blue
Recently I bought a shirt that I adore. A Calvin Klein, teal blue, boat-necked, drapey shirt with ¾ length sleeves, an extra long waist, and no ironing required. It was prefect! Problem was that I had nothing to wear on the bottom, and the most obvious choice was black.

The next week was awful.  With an upcoming party, my mission over the next week was to find the perfect pair of pants. I tried on 21 different pairs  and they all made me feel like I should be restocking a salad bar. With each pair of pants,  the image that I saw in the mirror was a middle-aged, sexless waitress from an all-you-can eat steak house, with an inexplicable gash across her belly. Ugh. So when I finally found a pair that were high waisted and  ‘sort of felt okay’, I got a bit excited and  decided to buy them.
In my living room I put on my party shit and new black pants and twirled in front of Jim. 
‘Great shirt!’ he said. 
I gestured towards the pants and asked him what he thought. 
‘They’re okay’,  he said. 
I spun around hopefully and his smile faded, ‘You kind of look like a server.’
'A classy server?’ I asked.
'No,' he said gently, ‘They kind of look like desperation pants.’

Fuck. Had I not learned anything in the last 25 years?   My golden rules are never to wear black pants, always trust my gut, and never to shop the week before a party. There is never a happy ending.

My Desperation Pants went back in the bag, and I went to the party in my one and only fun
dress, and had a great time. The Blue Calvin Shirt hangs in the closet, untouched, as are my standards.

2 comments:

  1. Man! My closet is FULL of desperation pants!! I love that you said that! I even have desperation pajamas! Lucky for me (not) when I work, my job calls for jeans. I mostly shop in the thrift store, and this last time, I actually found the most comfy ones were maternity jeans! True! Early pregnant, I think, there is just a wide tell tale "sweatpants"(?!?!) band around the waist. If they would actually stay up on me after an hour or two, I would wear them all the time! As comfy as jammies. But we have to get dressed sometimes....

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  2. I love comfy. And if something us super comfy I will wear it. Which is why, I try not to hang on to anything that is too sad or holey - or else I'd wear them all day. Every day

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