The Memories the Clothes Make
Expressing our insides on the outside.
Hi Togs Family,
I’ve returned from the Olympics and oh what an event! I went in not knowing what to expect, and if anything a bit nervous since crowds and noise are not my favorite things. But getting to see the Olympics was as magical as the press has been reporting. I would have never believed you if you told me that one day I’d cry watching a live javelin throw. My heart raced as the men and women looped around the lilac colored track. I felt closer to French citizenship rooting for the mens soccer players going for gold. The spirit was so joyful. Healthy competition mixed with an appreciation for the enormous mix of international humans all crammed into one spot moving their bodies in powerful and sometimes funny ways. I let out a small squeal when I picked Snoop Dogg out of the stadium of a 100,000 people. Clapped when the high jumpers asked the crowds to clap. And drooled when I put the sesame cheese cake pastry from Utopie* in my mouth. Finishing with a golden light on the opera house as the marathoners quickly ran by was perfect. I can’t thank the family that hosted me enough for inviting me-and will never second guess an Olympic invite ever again.
The only, only downside was that I brought back some sort of flu that has had me flattened to a pancake for the entire week. I guess that and potentially the downsize of realizing the best croissants really are in Paris and not in Chamonix….
So here is your second IOU…sparing you any images of my current state and instead reverting back to my love language of words. I’ll be back the week after Kellyn with shorts-because it actually is very much still summer here in Chamonix no matter who is telling you to buy sweaters and that winter is coming.
-Hadley
*Serious request: if any TOGSers are headed to Paris anytime soon, run immediately to Utopie and take whatever pastry cake thingy they have. My tongue both exploded and melted with satisfaction.
The Memories the Clothes Make
I had two complete sets each containing in solid color a stirrup legging and matching turtleneck with a complimentary plaid vest. One was red. The other the shade of blue green you could create by mixing a peacock feather and a stormy ocean.
It was my power suit for elementary school survival. Big reading test? Class photo? Rehearsal for the school play? I rememeber grabbing that specific outfit when I needed a boost of 7 year old bravery.
When I was a brownie level girl scout, my kind troop leaders let me order my own unique uniform. I was in the phase of wanting to do everything my brothers did. And they certainly weren’t wearing a little brown dress with a red necktie and beret. So instead, I was a flash of salmon color amongst the sea of brown wearing my offbeat Girl Scout emblemed sweat suit. In hindsight those brownie uniforms are pretty timeless, which I wouldn’t say about my sweat suit.
Around that same time, I quit ballet immediately after they told me I had to wear a pink tutu. Yet I seemed to have no problem jumping into a neon fringed leotard in figure skating. Or a red sequin flapper number. Or that crushed blue velvet onesie with white gloves. I wonder now if I didn’t like pink as a child (I still don’t love it as an adult) or if I didn’t like the restriction of a uniform.
My teens and twenties were a wild sartorial grab bag. Matching some/many of my antics at that time. Thank goodness I grew up without social media so there is only offline evidence of both the antics and some of the outfit choices. I remember there was a phase of leggings under mini skirts as my friends and I crammed into someones car to get personal large pizzas and Dairy Queen. There was the too skinny, too low cut, seven for all mankind denim collection of which I feel no regret for embracing both the times and my youthful metabolism. There was some adult like wardrobe foundations being built in-many a strapless black dress made appearances, particularly during the phase where my girlfriends and I would go out to dinner thinking we were the cast of Sex & the City, of course failing to convince any waiter that we were old enough for the cosmo drinking part of the reenactment.
If in my youth I rebelled against uniforms, I chased them my first year trying to compete in the freeskiing circuit. I was out of place with my brothers bent yellow race poles and my mountaineering lightweight puffy not to mention my serious lack of ski ability or history. I remember showing up in South America for my first competition where Ingrid Backstrom and Angel Collinson were decked out in their baggy, bold colored outerwear ready to wipe the competition with a few effortless turns. They won. I got last. Upon returning home, I immediately went into a store eager to find new pants and jacket to replace my tight shells. It would take a few years but eventually I found my confidence in the sport and within the community and returned to the tighter styles that suit me.
There are some clothes that still bring up such distinct memories…
Like the light green column dress with sparkled palm fronds that my grandmother bought me for my first prom. It looked less like Las Vegas gambling-wear than it sounds. I was a freshman going with my upperclassmen boyfriend. It turns out he cheated on me before that prom with the pretty new girl. But all I can do is smile thinking of that dress-because any sort of teen heartache I felt was overshadowed by the memory of my brother mean mugging the guy in the school hallway (which if you knew my brother, is a small stretch since he doesn’t have a mean bone in his body).
There’s a light grey suit still in my parents basement. My first suit, purchased to wear to work in Washington DC. My first city job. It was ill-fitting- the job, the city and the suit.
And there’s the turquoise necklace my mom gave me the first Christmas after my dad passed. The one I reach for on special occasions or just a regular Wednesday. My dad and I originally had thought of it for my mom for their anniversary. The last gift he would be able to give her, and I choked many a tears when she gave it to me.
Or the felted Steggman clogs I earned through one of my many illegal jobs I had before the age of 14. My brothers and I would get a pair of shoes of our choice for every fifty or so shoes we laced at the old Bootlegger in Jackson.
I don’t know where most of those clothes from my past are anymore. Most have been given away throughout all of life’s phases. Some gems are still well preserved at my parents house or here in France. But that instinct to express my insides through what I wear remains. I remain fascinated by the idea that functionally speaking, we could all just be walking around in brown sacks-yet we choose the magic of clothes instead.
The magic of matching our wild moods with our wild choices. Having those go-to pants or sweater when we need to feel bold, or safe, or silly.
And that’s what I’ve been trying to remember more and more these days when I feel myself or my wardrobe narrowing. Reminding myself to be that young Hadley who refuses a uniform and lets my mood clothe me.
If for nothing else, but for the way fabric can create visual memories. The way it can weave together a life.
“Wild moods with our wild choices”. Love this Hadley! We all have our comfort clothes, just like our comfort foods, and our wild ones also! Feel better!