trying it on…

I’m having some stage fright, not about playing gigs but, for one, knowing I have new readers to this thing I’ve been writing for so many years. Thank you for following and subscribing! Also, putting out a new book (pre-orders start this Friday Aug 22) I’ve worked so long and hard on. And really the most exciting and unprecedented, coming up in less than two months, my daughter’s wedding. What a singular day, and I get to be mother of the bride.

We think we know ourselves by the time we reach a certain age. Not entirely—there’s always room for growth and reinvention, but that’s versions of the we that already exists. By the time you reach…say your late sixties, there are precious few events that challenge our perception of who we are and how we present in the world. Moments where you need to be a different kind of best. A new job somewhere. Volunteering, opening a shop. Winning a prize of some kind, a Grammy maybe?

My daughter’s getting married – there was a surprise right there, I just never expected it! She’s not exactly traditional, and I don’t think of myself as normal. But she fell in love with a great guy and it’s wonderful, I’m so happy for them. Weddings brings out the expectations and a responsibility to show up in a way that will honor and enhance, not take away from the special day. The pressure is on! Delightful, once in a lifetime pressure.

Isn’t it great when we get to do something for another person? I need to find a dress to wear to Hazel’s wedding and so I made a sacrifice: I went shopping, in a store.

I think back to long ago when it was almost unthinkable for me to cross the threshold of a clothing establishment that wasn’t a thrift shop, secondhand, resale, charity shop. That was the best shopping, when clothes called out from the racks, not because they were the latest or best but because luck had put them there just for me: the tapestry coat, the bandana print dress, the red leather jacket all discarded by someone else to be scooped up by the right person at the right moment.

It’s been years since I had much luck thrift shopping. I guess you could say I lost my mojo. But also, most of the stuff on the racks is pretty run of the mill these days—in the US it seems to mostly come from Target and in the UK from Tesco. Also, size-wise, vintage stuff was made when people were generally super-skinny and whatever good old vintage is still in circulation can’t fit over my forearm let alone shoulders, bust and hips.

Back in the US I was having pretty good success with The Real Real—when Eric’s daughter’s wedding approached a few years back I scored a silk dress for under $100 and have even been able to rewear it a few times.

But that was more of a lark! I wasn’t one of the key players, more key player-adjacent. When I went into London the other day, to meet up with a friend at the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition and do whatever else felt right (I ended up seeing a George Bernard Shaw play, Mrs. Warren’s Profession starring Imelda Staunton – perfect) I wrote down a few shops and brands I’d been eyeing on the internet. Wouldn’t it be great to actually try some possibilities on in a store?

Well..not really. Remember when it was so intimidating to go in a fancy store? The employees watched your every move, breathed down your neck, circled, and either forced you out by looking at you like they knew you were going to steal or soil their goods, or used their wiles to flatter and cajole you into making a purchase.

The few times I’ve shopped in person anywhere in the last few years, it feels like people who work in stores actually hide from having to interact with customers. They’ll duck behind computer screens, suddenly be overcome by the urge to fold and stack items, take important customer calls on phones that are probably not even connected to anything. Who can blame them?

Or maybe it’s just being older. When I finally want to buy some of their clothing, they don’t really want to sell it to me. It might not be good for the brand, to have someone my age walk out with one of their garments in a bag. Levi’s is the absolute worst. Weird right? We, the Pepsi generation or whatever we were, created you!

I don’t know. The good thing is, the lack of customer service actually makes it a lot easier to take the plunge. I’ve loved the Liberty Department store for years but mostly in a nose pressed against the glass kind of way, a sad Dickens figure approaching the corner on Regent Street in London, walking back and forth a few times and maybe letting myself be swept in one of the worn wooden doors with a crowd of tourists. I think I bought a lipgloss on the ground floor once.

But the other day, reminding myself “It’s for my daughter! She’s counting on me!” I sashayed in and rode the elevator in shabby grandeur (the elevator, not me) up to the third floor for Women’s Clothing. There were a few things I’d been eyeing online and why not try them on?

Only —it was a really hot day. London is not air-conditioned. The Royal Academy had been glorious but my face was as red as cadmium, my hair gone limp.

The clothing floor was pretty, low-beamed, old wood with casement windows. The sales women hid behind computer screens but motioned me to a dressing room when I asked. The shirts and printed dress I’d coveted enveloped me in a Liberty dream that only made me wish I were wan and lithe with big spiky eyelashes like a girl in a Biba ad from the late 60s. I was so hot and sweaty, I felt like Shelley Winters in The Poseidon Adventure only she’d been wet because, you know-the boat was sinking.

I sighed and hung the items on their hangers, and walked out into the balcony section of the floor. They had other brands out there, it was like encountering a bunch of supporting actors in one of your favorite TV series: Reformation, Rixo. Then I saw it— a crisp red poplin dress.

It was a brand I’d never heard of. The fabric felt so good, perfect for October in Los Angeles. They had a size L! I went back to the dressing room, after noting the saleswoman still didn’t care. This is great, I thought —like playing dress up. It’s actually a dream come true, no one hovering. You could try on clothes all day!

The dress was perfect. Like it had been made for me. Except…I couldn’t get it zipped up. I breathed in, I twisted. I thought of leaning out the door and asking for help but just couldn’t do it.

Maybe…an XL? I could always hem it. I put my own clothes back on and walked over to the rack. The only other size was XS. “Excuse me,” I asked another girl hunched over her computer. “Do you have other sizes in stock?” She politely told me “Try looking online.”

I looked up the brand, took a photo of the dress I liked, and did some more browsing. I even wandered through the famous fabric floor, marveling at all the patterns I’d admired online over the years, right there in the…not flesh – in the thread. Here things were more tightly controlled than in clothing, the bolts sort of needed to be checked out like library books – you could look, but touch, not so much.

I felt sure I had found a dress. So I was free to just spend the rest of my time in London enjoying myself, since the pressure was off. I stopped at the makeup counter on the way out of Liberty and asked about a particular mascara whose brand they carry. “Try online!” the salesperson told me sweetly.

When I got back home I found the dress on the designer’s website and ordered it, the price a third cheaper. BUT they only had the same size I’d tried in the store. Here’s where magical thinking entered in: I’d been bloated and sweaty or else that zipper would’ve flown right up my side. If only I’d had help, things could’ve been arranged to squeeze it all in so the zipper would contain me. A bodysuit with a little contol could tame whatever was in the way of the too tight part.

The dress came in a day, that’s a beautiful thing about living in the UK. You could say mail works quicker because it’s a much smaller place but they are just more efficient than in the US. Sometime in New York it felt like I could’ve walked to New Jersey and back in the time it took for packages to reach me from there, one state a hundred miles away.

I waited til yesterday when the weekend’s gig was over. I wanted to be clean, dry, and calm. I’d told Eric about my plans to wear this dress and how it might involve not eating so much bread. I’d already denied myself a pastry with coffee and was feeling smug. Cut down on alcohol. Losing five or ten pounds would be easy, and beneficial for all kinds of reasons.

The dress floated over my head. The color was even better than in the store. I’d googled whether it was okay to wear a red dress to your daughter’s wedding —that was my one worry, that it might be too much a cry for attention, and the kind of stuffy sites who give advice on this sort of thing did say it was, while not as inappropriate as white, acceptable only if the hue wasn’t too vibrant and trashy. These are probably the people who say you can’t wear white shoes after Labor Day too. Here’s where you wonder who sets these rules and why do weddings suddenly make us care?! I’d sent my daughter a pic and she’d loved the dress. It was all cool except—

In reality the zipper was a good five inches away from zipping up. No amount of dieting would make this work. I’d have to lose a rib. It had all seemed too easy, one of the first dresses I tried on being the one.

Eric had to excavate me from the dress.

Anyway, the red started to look too red. The cotton poplin lovely but not special enough. The dress is going back, the search kicks into high gear.

Good news is I don’t have to lose ten pounds. I need to work with where I’m at and find the right thing. Maybe not red? I owe it to my daughter.