I think it was bad karma to make fun of my grandmother-in-law in my last entry. If you missed it, she forgot to put on underwear for Thanksgiving dinner. There. You’re all caught up. Now, back to karma. On occasion, I too forget to put on underwear. And by forget, I mean choose not to.
Today was one of those days.
I have a variety of reasons why I sometimes drop the undies from my ensemble. For instance, on hot days I don’t like to wear them as I’m more prone to get horrible wedgies. Apparently my ass likes to use the back of my undergarments as a make-shift sweatband. Other times, I don’t want my Hanes-Her-Way-panty-lines to distract from how cute my ass looks in my pants. And, yes, I’ve heard of g-strings, but I find them as comfortable as sitting on a tightrope.
Today’s reason, however, was neither of the above. It was a combination of laziness (I came out of the shower and forgot to grab a pair) and feeling like a sexy lioness (last night I was surrounded by really unattractive lesbians, which led me to believe I was Victoria Secret’s next Angel).
I wasn’t going anywhere important. Just my Sunday morning routine: pancakes at Green Street Cafe (I felt more like a plus size model after breakfast); and writing at my super-secret satellite location (The Librarian’s office). The wrench was thrown into the routine when The Librarian noticed an advertisement for a local clothing store going out of business. “Going out of business,” it read in big bold letters. “Everything must go.”
To know me well is to know one small detail: my complete aversion to shopping. If you know me really well, you know that the real reason I go away for Christmas is not to have to shop for anyone. And, if you are in my “All Access” privacy setting on Facebook, you know that the one store I hate most on the face of this Earth is Syms, which happened to be the one going out of business.
I acquiesced to The Librarians request to go there because, of course, I love her and sometimes you need to make sacrifices like that to make a relationship work. That and I felt guilty about subjecting her to the ugly lesbian show the night prior. We got to the store with a mere hour and a half before closing and I, surprisingly, decided to keep an open mind and not behave like a ten year old at the bank.
I began browsing around, while The Librarian attacked the racks like she was on Supermarket Sweep. Like a victim of mass hysteria, I too began pulling items off the shelves and racks. I even went as far as to get a shopping cart to place the clumsy garments on hangers, so I can free my hands for more perusing. The entire time I couldn’t remember why it was exactly that I didn’t like good-old-Syms. The prices were great and the clothes were all brand names.
I met up with The Librarian in “Misses Knitted Tops” and she plopped down her items in my overflowing cart. “We need to try all of this on,” she said. “All sales are final, so we can’t leave here without knowing it fits.” Reason number 452 of why I hate shopping: trying on clothes. I can’t get dressed in a cubicle. I need space. I like to walk around in my clothes. I need to squat and make sure the pants don’t split. I can’t do all that in a fitting room without knocking into the walls and scaring the crap out of everyone else. Plus, being in close quarters with naked women makes me nervous. It’s why I don’t like using public bathrooms. And why I don’t go to a female gynecologist. I can’t help it.
So, against my better judgement, we went into the fitting room. The Librarian leading me in like it was my first day of school, “You go into this stall and I’ll be right here in the one next door.” But, when I look up, I remembered the reason why I loathed this store so much. It was the fitting rooms! These medieval clusters that look like a horses’ stable in the center of the room with saloon doors that don’t close right. You can see everyone from the collarbone up and from the thigh down – if you’re the right height. I, unfortunately, am not the right height. So, you can only see me from the nose up and my…
Right.
That’s when it hit me that I wasn’t wearing any underwear.
Mari de Armas 