Last Friday I realized that there was going to be a joint family birthday celebration on the weekend for Jake and my dad, and, like always, I needed to buy a gift for my dad. For some reason I always, always leave his birthday gift for the last minute, and then make a panicked rush to the mall where I wonder what to get a sixtyish man who has everything, and end up buying the same splash aftershave that I always buy. This is exactly what I did last Friday, and when I got home I opened a drawer to find the golf shirt I bought for him a month before in an effort to bypass my usual end-of-September panicked mall rush. I guess I can cross him off my Christmas list, that is, if I remember.
While I was at the mall I decided, in addition to purchasing evidently redundant birthday gifts, I needed to look for a pair of jeans. My stay-at-home mom uniform consists of jeans, and a couple of my standbys are getting quite threadbare. So I popped into a jean store, spotted a super-perky eighteen year old salesgirl, and said, like a hip Betty White, “I need some jeans that will make my butt look really good!” She nodded earnestly and said seriously “I totally understand. I have a really bad butt too.” Hm. That wasn’t exactly the response I expected. I was still a little congested, so I stood there for a moment wondering if perhaps I had misheard her – after all, who would actually say that – but I couldn’t, and still can’t, figure out what might had been said instead.
As an aside, any of my girlfriends to whom I have related this story have reacted with appropriate horror, but my husband seems to have taken a peculiar blame-the-victim stance, saying that I shouldn’t have asked for something to improve the look of my butt as that implies that I do, indeed, have a bad butt. So it’s really my fault, in his view, and the salesgirl was just trying to help. I do not think I agree with this assessment.
Anyway, maybe my bad-butt bonding with the salesgirl was actually beneficial, because she brought me the most comfortable and flattering jeans that I have ever worn. I’m wearing them right now as a matter of fact. However, before she brought me my new favourite jeans, she brought me a pair of skinny jeans, just for “fun”. Against my better judgement, I tried them on. I had a small self-esteem crisis right there in the change room. Not only were they terribly unflattering, but they were also an unwelcome and unnecessary reminder of the Flight of Time, since they strongly resembled jeans I wore over two decades ago. Remember safety pinning the ankles of your jeans? Or rolling them tightly? Or – if you had a mother who knew her way around a sewing machine, as I did – having them sewn tightly along the calf and ankle? Yeah.
Never again. After this debacle, someone told me that the Gap sells skinny jeans that are, apparently, awesome, so I looked them up on their website. That’s when I saw these. Stirrup jeans!! Stirrups! I never thought I would see the day, I tell you. Flight of Time indeed.
Dear Nicole,
You might as well not tell me that stirrups are coming back into style, because I will not (CAN not) believe you, per earlier trauma AKA late ’80s / early ’90s.
Love, Swistle
I saw the stirrup jeans with my own eyes. They were too awful for words.
Hi Nicole,
This post has me chuckling. I ran across your blog on Mothering Mayhem and decided to pay a visit to you because I too am a girl in a house of boys, 4 to be exact (1 hubby and 3 darling sons). My only reprieve is our cat, Chelsea who is a girl, not that she’s much company at times.
Loved your post. So nice to have run across your blog.
Good Lord Almighty. The fashion gods need to stop digging around in my history because I can’t live through more stirrup pants. I won’t!
Stirrup pants. Ha, ha. My husband bought my skinny jeans and I took them back. It isn’t until I read this post until I realized why I perhaps don’t like them. I do remember the safety pins. Too funny.
LisaDay
oh man. the safety pins around the ankles of mah jeans…i had almost forgotten. time flows like cheap wine, baby.
glad you found nice ones. are you going to tell us what they ARE? so we too can buy them?
Remember jeans that were so tight they had zippers at the cuff? I use to love those.
The most reviled fashion that has been revisited has GOT to be blouses w/ bows on the front. BLERGH. Stirrup pants seem mild in comparison.
I am closing my eyes and pretending that skinny jeans and stirrup pants don’t exist.
Please tell, what brand and style are the most flattering and comfortable jeans?!! Jeans are my daily staple, too.
Okay, here is a link to my new favourite jeans. They fit so well. I love them so much I want to marry them. Or at least make out with them.
Sorry, that was weird. It’s Saturday and my husband has taken the kids and I am giddy.
http://www.silverjeans.com/sjdev/wgdetail.pgm?seq=2_346_355&stsku=L9538SAF438
I forgot to mention – the store I bought them from had a 25% off sale, so great jeans and a good deal! Hooray!
Stirrup jeans are funny. Are big high, hairsprayed bangs on the comeback too? Let me know.
I love the story about the salesgirl comment and Rob’s reaction. You have a way with words.