My diet is coming along well. As I get closer to “human” proportions, my old fat clothes are getting looser and looser. The handful of old “skinny” clothes that I stowed away last diet, are starting to fit. But, while the years and pounds piled on, I had to take most of the smaller clothing off to Good Will. So now, I am giddy to report, I need to buy “all new clothes.” Fact is, I have been buying new clothes, while at the same time my tailor, Rocco Thimbale, has found a profit center in taking in my “fat” clothes.
“I can always make smaller,” Rocco tells me, looking over the half glasses on the tip of his nose, “its make bigger that’s harder.”
Which is a reminder to me that losing weight is fairly easy, once you make the commitment and find a plan to which you can stick. The real trick is keeping it off once you get to your “target weight.” I will cross that bridge, and alas, probably eat it, when the time comes, but meanwhile, the UPS boxes are bouncing on the front porch like acorns, full of clothing, the next size down. Rocco’s sewing machine whirs in the distance.
One recent Saturday, in an attempt to find things to do (combined with my clothes-buying frenzy), I suggested that we take a field trip to Chester Dibble’s, a long-established, upscale clothing store, in a long-established, upscale town a few exits up the turnpike. In spite of our long tenures in the area, we had, neither of us, been to Chester Dibble’s, so we fired up the old Volvo.
We walked though Chester Dibble’s huge glass doors and onto the sales floor. As usual, the men’s section was Rhode Island to the women’s section’s Texas. I headed off in one direction, Melissa in the other.
The first thing I noticed was the quality of the merchandise . And how nice, I thought, to actually see it and feel it before buying it, a luxury I had not found through Google. Then, as I admired a sweater, I casually flipped the price tag, tucked discretely under the collar. Twelve hundred dollars? For a sweater? I began to flip other nearby price tags and soon discovered that I was way out of my league. The sales staff had evidently already come to the same conclusion, for, while there were just a handful of customers in the store, I was not approached even once by a clerk to see if there was something with which I could be helped.
We continued to wander through the aisles, being ignored, flipping tags and feeling alien. The clothing on these tables and shelves and tucked about the waists of headless mannequins was mostly geared up for weekend wear; the suits were in a separate area. It brought about a whole flood of thoughts through my mind.
I guess, in another universe, the usual customers who actually get waited on at Chester Dibble’s have crossed a line of which I am unaware. Theirs is a lifestyle that involves weekends. The alarm clock blows on Saturday morning – or maybe it doesn’t – and there is an entire set of clothing that is worn for weekend activity. I gather, from the quality and price of these garments, that this weekend lifestyle is devoid of labor of any kind. Unless carrying a shaker of martinis from the Land Rover to the yacht is considered laborious. I envision paneled dens from my real estate days, logs cracking in the fireplaces, fine cashmere draped over the shoulder, tasseled, $800 loafers propped on the leather ottoman, as the portfolio scrolls on the flat-screen, 50-year old single malt scotch glints in the Waterford tumbler.
“Ah, Saturday morning. Perhaps a sojourn to Chester Dibble’s? I could use a pair of $200 socks.”
My life is a bit different. Saturday means a day to do all the things I couldn’t get to during the week when I was in a coma. Melissa has an agenda: yoga, errands for her mother, preparing lesson plans for her class. I always have a list. It often includes a trip to the dump, a combination of words that is not on the to-do list of pink cashmere sweater crowd .
My best clothes, even the ones I have been buying via Google, are not what I wear when I am driving my truck into landfills. I tend to wear a hodgepodge of ill-fitting britches and tunics, collected through the years and now, with my diminishing proportions, often falling off.
Melissa waltzes through the acres of woman’s clothing, pausing briefly to peak at the jewelry cases. Suddenly the quiet din of discreet cash registers drawers is broken by the unmistakable sound of pedigreed dogs tussling over by the alpaca and angora tea cozies. I guess a tradition of Chester Dibble’s is the freedom to bring the dog along. So quaint!
I realize that many patrons are led on leashes, as the two scrapping canines rear up on their freshly-manicured back paws, they growl and nip at each other. So gauche!
I look over and realize that this is not my kind of place. Even if I was the type to light my $25 cigars with $100 bills, I’d likely not buy my Saturday leisure togs at Chester Dibble’s. Like the chain stores I am more known to haunt, I have never been attracted to racks of identical clothing, regardless of price. I prefer wearing things that I most likely will not see on other members of the country club. Fashion, to me, is not dictated by the consensus of a tax bracket, rather by what is comfortable, looks good and fits.
No one even tried to thank us for coming or suggest we return very soon, as we pushed the heavy glass doors open and escaped to our 1987 Volvo and headed back down the highway to reality.
And there was a box on the porch when we got home.
The sweaters were very nice.
