THE FASHION POLICE HAVE ARRIVED!

I really try to mind my business every morning. Really, I do, I give her the paper to read first, I don’t talk to her as she is watching another husband get murdered on a recorded Criminal Intent and listen sympathetically when she talks, but TLW (The Little Woman) has certain criteria that I must be held to.

The other morning for example she came into the den where I was minding my own business, doing nothing but writing on my laptop. I know when I over stayed my time in the den because she enters with a fast shuffle, looking down with a frown on her face and she is talking.

“Joe, you know you have a lot of jeans in your drawer and some of them are very old. You should go into the drawer and toss the ones that are all worn. Throw them out, when things get old, throw them out, what are you saving them for?”

“Well, we’ve kept each other around, I figured…”

“And another thing, I’m moving your socks from the cubby hole in your dresser into the drawers on the bottom. I already tossed a bunch of old socks out. I’m mixing your white socks with the remainder of your black ones. You will need the space for your winter shirts that will take up more room then your summer ones.”

“I’d like to toss…”

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“By the way, do you have a clean pressed suit for the wedding Sunday?”

“Wedding?”

“Yes, we have a wedding to go to on Sunday.”

“Oh, yeah, we do. I don’t know, I know I don’t do any gardening it them!”

Now this could be the kitchen needing to be redecorated, or our bedroom needing a fresh coat of paint, she does the same thing to me, shuffles in very business like and begins the process of ruining my future, bring me to tears and putting me on suicide watch, it is almost a patented method.

Her methodology is designed to get me seriously listening, paying attention to the details and leaving me no room to plead my case, and it works!

Now I love my jeans old. The older the more comfortable they are. I hate new clothes and I hate new shoes. Socks? Ah!

You spend a great deal of time breaking in jeans to make them feel comfortable, and like my shirts, any stains only takes away the agony of worrying about staining them, since once I get pizza juice on a shirt, it becomes a I don’t care anymore shirt, worn by an old guy with nowhere to go but to someday visit his new grandchild, who will see me in a new shirt, pants and shoes and maybe socks other than white!

TLW has no sentiment for my attachment to comfortable clothes. Hey, I’m no one special, just an ordinary 39 year old with no place to go, so why all the excitement?

The Little Woman on the other hand is always buying herself new clothes, or shoes or tops, me, new underwear is an event, the last time I bought a pair of socks for myself, I was mad at what Jimmy Carter was doing in the White House. I’m just not the type to fuss anymore. Oh, I used to, when I worked all my clothes were color coordinated, and people noticed. But my feet would be tired at the end of a day with the shoes on, my neck constricted because of a tie and I was always brushing or watching or covering shirts and pants from possible stains. I want a break now, leave me alone, let me wallow in my own stains, frayed jeans and spotty striped shirts or t-shirts with places I have been to, all in color and comfortably stained!