What to Wear

So, the thing is... I don't know what to wear.

Over the holidays, I retired my favorite pair of jeans. They were worn and had holes, and after my three-year-old, Ana, threw up all over me and the couch, I washed them with a red sofa cushion cover and turned them slightly pink. It seemed like a sign that it was time to give them to Goodwill so some teenager could buy them and make the holes bigger and wear them, much to her parent's disgust. I folded them and gave them away, feeling a little sad that all good things must end.

Gosh, they were a great pair of jeans. Basic Levi's but with a button fly --made me swagger a little when I wore them. I'd probably had them ten years or so and I'd made a lot of memories in those jeans. I wore them when I was dating my husband and I wore them on many of our adventures together. They were the way I measured my progress on getting my body back after my pregnancies since I am not one of those women who comes home from the hospital in her old jeans after delivering a baby. (Heck, I couldn't even wear my HUSBAND'S old jeans after having MY kids. Sigh.)

Anyway, they were perfect --not too short, not too long, not too tight. Just a great pair of jeans. I was dreading trying to find another that was half as good --in my whole life, I've probably only had three other pairs of jeans that were perfect in every way like that. Even if you buy ones that are the same exact size and model and manufacturer, there are always tiny differences. A good pair of jeans is hard to find.

I hate to shop for clothes, absolutely HATE it, so I thought I'd try the Internet first. I went to the Gap online and while I found some great deals on clothes for my kids, I couldn't find jeans in my size at the on-line store. I did send out a note to some of my girlfriends about the sale, though. A friend of mine wrote back to say that she loved the Gap's children's clothes but SHE no longer had the right rear end for their jeans.

I gulped.

I hadn't even thought of that. I mean, the last time I actually bought jeans was before I had children and given that I've lost all but five (eight) pounds of my baby weight, I just assumed I'd fit into jeans like I used to...

So I took a deep breath and I recited a calming mantra and I did it.

I headed for the mall.

I couldn't really remember where I had bought my great pair of jeans so I headed for a department store that was having a big sale. I found the Women's Sportswear department and chose three or four pairs of jeans, stood in line for a fitting room, and began to try them on. Not a single pair fit me. They were invariably too big in the waist, or had excess material in front, or the legs didn't hang right. Anyway, I rejected them all and headed back out for a new selection.

Directly across the aisle from the women's section was a wide expanse of denim --the Junior's department. I had a bad feeling but I chose a few pair --the least sequined, tea-washed, bell-bottomed ones I could find -- and headed for the nearest fitting room. I tried on the first pair.

Oh. Oh my. Oh, dear. Oh, NO. Oh, nononono. I think not. The last time I wore a pair of hip-huggers, I was about seven-years-old, thank you very much, and thirty years later is just a bit too late. Clearly, oh SO clearly, these were not the perfect jeans for me.

“Where are the basic LEVI'S?” I wondered out loud. “In the MEN'S department,” said a passing clerk. Oh. Of course.

Great.

So I gave up and went home and I came to the realization that this whole shopping experience mirrors the weird in-between place I find myself in general these days. I'm definitely no longer a Junior. But I am also not really the solid WOMAN that I feel I should be at the age of (almost) 37. My LIFE doesn't quite fit. I feel like I'm half a confident mother of two and half an imposter; half grown-up and half something else entirely.

It's not the aging I resent. I don't really care about getting older. In the seasons of my life, I'm still only about halfway through Summer. I would never trade my life as a young thing for my life now. It's just that I never noticed the transition. Sort of like this past year when I realized that my Ana has MORNING BREATH now. When did THAT happen? When did she leave her sweet-smelling babyhood behind? I feel the same way about leaving my young adulthood in the past. I would have liked some sort of flying-up ceremony, like when I was in the Girl Scouts.

And I'd like to have some sort of NAME or job description for where I am now. I have a bunch of ideas of what I am NO LONGER but no real concept of what it is I am supposed to be NOW. Maybe the department stores need another category. We've got the Junior's department and we've got the Women's department --what about a category for those of us who fall somewhere in between? Sort of a “Very much past the hip hugger/big shoes stage" but not quite to the “Got my last kid in school and I’m ready to party like a wild pig" stage.

You know, I spent my twenties trying to be someone ELSE --someone better, someone more important, someone who lived up to her potential. And then I turned thirty. (Let me freely admit that I did not Go Gently Into That Good Night. I was in a bad mood for, oh, about a YEAR before the fateful day.) Suddenly, something miraculous happened. I realized that THIS is the person I am going to be when I grow up. Here I am, World! MGM is probably not ever going to offer me a multi-picture contract. I'm probably not going to end hunger single-handedly. Heads of state are apparently making decisions completely independent of my brilliance.

And, oh yeah, so these are my hips.

So, I got to a nice state of acceptance of myself and then I entered this completely foreign world called motherhood and assumed all of the responsibilities and worldly trappings inherent in being somebody's Mommy. And it doesn't quite FIT, yet. It's strange that I can't even remember the last time a high-school boy “yo! checked me ouuutttt,” as opposed to calling me “ma'am” and allowing me to buy wine without showing my I.D. Not that I WANT some high school boy hitting on me but you know what I mean. Some rite of passage occurred, like the retirement of my favorite jeans, but I didn't get to mark it. And because I didn't get to acknowledge it, I don't know quite where I am now.

Well, hmm, now that I think about it, I'm not sure I can remember a time in my life when I knew exactly what was expected of me and where I was in the journey. Perhaps that's the big secret --NO ONE really knows. Maybe life is just a big Improvisation. Maybe we're ALWAYS in transition. And maybe as soon as we THINK we know what's next, that's when we find ourselves looking for a completely different wardrobe --one that fits without being too long or too short or too tight. And then it's time to retire those comfortable jeans from our previous, well-defined existence. I guess at some point, those jeans were new, too, and we didn't know whether they'd be the ones that fit exactly right either.

The truth is, I'm not the girl I used to be. Neither am I yet the woman I will become.

I do, however, know what she'll be wearing.

Leggings.

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Barbara Cooper is the mother of Ana (3.75) and Jane (15 months). She lives in Austin, Texas and she can't find jeans that fit her children, either.