I have always loved clothes. My mother and I made our own in the 1980s and 1990s. I could knit and sew before I could read or write. I’m not interested in designer labels or high fashion, but there are small-scale designers and makers whose eye for pattern and colour and skills in cutting, folding and seaming delight me. Clothes well made by fairly paid people out of good quality fabric are not and should not be cheap. You don’t need many, they rarely need replacing, and I know how to mend them. But sometimes the new, unnecessary things are very alluring. Just because it’s lovely doesn’t mean you have to own it, my husband says, and he’s right, but sometimes not right enough.
In the great divestment of stuff necessitated by simultaneous emigration and double-down-sizing four years ago, I reduced my – modest enough - wardrobe by about two-thirds. Since then, every purchase has been matched by a parting: one in, one out. It focuses the mind, but even with the mind in focus and a cooling-off period passed, I had a few longed-for things in an online basket. I found myself rifling my clothes with a ruthless eye, making a pile of the little-worn.
It’s probably not surprising that most of that pile turned out to have been saved for special occasions. Two dresses bought because the more assertive woman I’d like to be would wear them; a velvet jacket that against all policy has survived several moves unworn because it’s so beautifully made and sits so well, but I’d be afraid to get rain or spills on it, and my husband once fatally remarked that the nap would be worn down by the strap of any bag I carried; a perfectly cut long “evening coat” from the same maker that just feels too smart for the likes of me and is also impractical on a bike. I looked at the pile with impatience and a little sadness, having expecting to cull worn old things rather than pristine posh stuff. Lesson I already knew: you don’t change your life or personality by shopping.
I think one of the cheerier lessons of living here now, in our strangely pampered end times on our so-far strangely safe island, might be that we should wear our best things and dance on our best carpets
Several lesser conclusions suggest themselves: I do not, in fact, attend “special occasions”. Whatever they might be, they don’t happen around me, and I find it hard to imagine a realistic example. Maybe next time I’m in Vienna I’ll go to the opera? (I enjoy opera when opportunity presents itself, not so far in Vienna, and usually in the cheap seats wearing a nice scarf over whatever I had on that day.) One day, will I finally go to the ball? (I would be miserable there.)
Every piece of clothing I buy is matched by a parting: one in, one out. It focuses the mind
Jewellery might not always leave us with a clear conscience but it’s fun, and pleasure is not trivial
People trying to sell diets enrage me on good days. On bad days I feel inadequate
Women are safer on the streets and men are safer at home, despite the stories we tell ourselves
I remember an older relative commenting about my blue silk wedding dress - she disapproved - that at least I would be able to wear it again for parties with dinner and dancing. In 25 years there has been no party with dinner and dancing except other people’s weddings, and it was enough of a wedding dress for that to be Not On. Maybe I just live a cheerfully informal life and should arrange my wardrobe accordingly.
And maybe the special occasion is here and now, is being alive on this day in this place. This idea has limits: if the work of the day is gardening or bread-making, the velvet jacket isn’t a good choice. But maybe for work, for errands, for coffee with friends, why not? If rain falls, if soup spills, isn’t that what it’s like, being here and now? It’s not as if those clothes are having a good time at the back of the cupboard.
I remember my grandparents having new carpets laid in the 1980s, and then a thick plastic cover over the new carpets, frosted in a pattern like an old-fashioned bathroom window. We were allowed to walk only on the area covered by the plastic, to keep the carpet for best. And maybe best came when I wasn’t there; I hope it did, I hope when they had friends over they peeled off the modesty-protecting frosted plastic and bared that soft carpet for all to tread – to dance - but I suspect not. I think one of the cheerier lessons of living here now, in our strangely pampered end times on our so-far strangely safe island, might be that we should wear our best things and dance on our best carpets because the special occasion is that we are, for now, here.
