Published in the Houston Chronicle 09/26/99

What Good Is a Closet if it Can’t Store Memories? 

              It took several fashion mistakes, size changes, and throw downs instead of hang ups to make my spacious closet look like it needed “Enter at you own risk” posted at the entrance.  And so, I thought it would be nice to have a straightened, organized closet once before the end of the millenium.  Even though I am a clutter lover I realized that a walk-in closet meant you should be able to walk-into it.   My husband, a neat freak, felt pride in my decision.  I saw it in his eyes.   I knew he hoped that my newfound neatness would flood over into other areas.   

As I opened my closet door, I looked down at shoes covering the floor in a sea of colors and shapes: lavender platforms, fuchsia pointy toes, baby blue go-go boots.   Most of my shoes are a size 71/2 except for one pair of size 10 sandals, bought when I was nine months pregnant with my last baby.   That “baby” is now twenty-four years old.  Time to send those shoes off to someone else’s swollen, pregnant feet.  I think I should keep the rest of my shoes in anticipation of fashion repeats.   I still regret throwing away my black patent leather tap shoes in 1963…my mother made me.

Next I started rummaging through my skirts, blouses, and slacks; most jammed together on tired wire hangers.  When had I worn clothes so short, so tight, so garish, and so slinky?   When I was younger?  No doubt.  When I was thinner?   Maybe, but I preferred to think most of my clothes had shrunk in the wash.  One by one I took the skirts off their hangers, held them up to my ample waistline, and remembered when I wore them last.  One skirt and blouse I bought for my son’s pre-school graduation.  He is now twenty-eight.  Another felt skirt and cashmere sweater I wore to a ‘50s costume party…it had not been a costume until then.  The hip huggers in a pile on the floor looked long past their usefulness.  Worn at a time when I didn’t have any thighs. The last time I wore the denim bellbottoms, patched at the knees, Nixon was not a crook and I was still a believer.   The discard pile seemed like the logical choice, but…

Then I came to the white and brightly-colored T-shirts tossed haphazardly on my closet shelves. Their history was printed in bold block letters obvious to all.  The college shirts from Texas A&M and Pepperdine University bought when we were poor parents of hard-working students (or was it the other way around?).  And then, how could I throw out the T-shirt boasting my daughter’s high school Waterpolo championship?  Or my son’s peewee football team?  I put them back on the shelves along with the T-shirt of the whale rising out of the ocean, from Maui; the wolf howling at the moon, from Minnesota; and George Michael gyrating on stage, from my one and only rock concert.  I will give away the T-shirt presented to me at the workout gym after I joined…I don’t go anymore…maybe I should.  

 Next came the nightgowns.  There were the negligees from my bridal shower, more than 100 years ago, all silky, slinky, and not worn lately.  Then the teddies I bought when I was young and energetic.  I haven’t been young and energetic almost as long as I haven’t worn that pair of size 10 sandals.    I will keep the sensible pajamas, in washable fabrics, with pictures of yellow happy faces on the front, and maybe one slinky gown.

The work is done. I am finished.  I had good intentions to give away all my old clothes and outdated shoes…I swear.  But then I realized my history rested in that discard pile at my feet.  My clothes and shoes whispered stories in my head.  Stories I never wanted to forget. A time when my body was smaller and I had an unknown future.  It’s hard to know what to give away and what to keep.  Isn’t it important to savor good memories?   And now that I am 50, I need mementos to trigger my brain spark plugs into remembering.

I can’t wear many of the clothes now, but you never know.  Someday they may come back in style again.  Someday I may be thin again. I have taken all my old, worn shoes and clothes out of my closet and stuffed them into big, green plastic trash bags.  I can now walk into my walk-in closet.

My husband has just praised me for cleaning my closet and asked if I felt pride in my accomplishment.  I assured him that I felt wonderful about what I had done.

Gee, I sure hope he doesn’t look under our bed.