Garrison Keillor’s “Writer’s Almanac” on June 15 noted the birthday of Ilene Beckman. I’d never heard of her before. She wrote a book called “Love, Loss, and What I Wore.” In it she insists that clothing plays an integral part in many women’s memories, that they can recall important events or distinct spans of their lives by what they were wearing at the time.
A bit I used to use in my Twain show goes like this: “People sometimes ask why I wear this white suit. Well, I’ve traveled all over the world and associated with all sorts of people, royalty, savages, and ordinary everyday people, and one thing that has always struck me no matter where I go is: Clothes make the man. Naked people have very little influence in our society.”
Well, I’m not sure that clothes make the man, but I think they “date” the man. Quite a few of the clothes in my closet date back a few years, some of them for more than just a few years. I have T-shirts from road races I ran in over 30 years ago and from Beaver Dam Area Community Theater shows I was in before that. I still have the socks I wore when we were married 54 years ago July 1. For some reason, I’m saving the socks. Sentimental guy, huh? I wore those socks for every one of our five kids’ weddings!
I’m going to step out on a limb here and make a generalization that might get me in trouble. I have not done any scientific research to back up my premise, only casual observation. “Women are different about clothes.” Marilyn can tell you what she was wearing for almost every major event she’s ever attended. She knows what she was wearing on our first date — talk about major events! And I know she’s not alone in that ability because I’ve heard other women say the same thing. I, on the other hand, can’t remember what I wore last weekend.
For example, a couple of years ago, we were having dinner with some friends and one lady asked us when it was that our son Mark had gotten married. She was trying to decide the age of the outfit she was wearing. “Because,” she said, “I bought this to take to Hawaii for Mark’s wedding.” She said that’s how she dates her clothes, by what occasion she bought them for. Other women at the table said they do that, too.
Occasionally, usually about the time that we get the Easter Seals notice that they’ll be in the neighborhood, Marilyn convinces me to go through my stuff and cull the things I no longer wear. I sometimes grudgingly contribute a few little items, but it’s hard to give up some of those “perfectly good” clothes.
Every 15 years or so, I buy some new underwear, whether I need it or not. And when my sock drawer starts looking a little empty, I’ll break down and buy some new ones, but only if they’re on sale!
A few years ago, when we were about to leave on a trip to Italy, a friend gave us a suggestion. She said, “When you pack, pack all your oldest underwear and then just throw it away. That way you don’t have to carry around your dirty laundry and you’ll have more room to bring home souvenirs.” So I actually did that; I left a trail of old underwear in hotels in several Italian cities. What if we’d been in an accident in Italy? My mom would have been horrified if I’d been taken to an Italian hospital and I was wearing rotten underwear!
And women have “rules” about clothes, too. Like “you only wear white between Easter and Labor Day.” Where did that come from? I went to the Internet and found out that it’s difficult to pin down. Perhaps the point of the rule is to make those “Summer Fashion Sales” more meaningful. But if you lived in an area with summer temperatures year-round, what would be the harm in wearing white shoes or a head-to-toe white outfit in October? Mark Twain wore his white suit all year around, and you know what he says: “Clothes make the man!”
