To The Mall

Not exactly where I wanted to be on the Monday before Thanksgiving, but I promised C that I would go to the Mall with her and her mom to look for some party clothes for the upcoming holiday, and today is the only free day I had before Thanksgiving. C's mom kept telling me that she ends up with a headache and a knot in her stomach after even a little shopping trip with C.

Now how can that be, with my sweet little C? It didn't take me long to find out the reason. With all good motherly intentions, L (C's mom) kept finding things on the rack for C to try on. Trouble was, the things that L picked out were things that she liked, not what C liked. L just couldn't understand why her daughter didn't even want to try some of the things on, much less buy them.

I tried to diplomatically tell L that C's tastes in clothes were going to be totally different from hers, just given the fact that she's 14 years old, not 24 or 44. C definitely knows what she likes, but she doesn't have enough experience in getting "the right look" to look right on her. If the material is scratchy, she doesn't like the outfit, which is understandable. If it doesn't look right from the back, then she's not going to like the front. If it isn't soft enough, doesn't move enough, isn't "right" enough, then no amount of pleading from her mother or anyone else is going to make her wear it.

I told both L and C and I had the same problem when I was a teenager and my mother and I would go shopping for clothes for me. My mother pulled things off the rack that she liked, or things that she would've worn when she herself was my age. Well, pardon me, but that just hardly ever works. The end result would be that I would end up in tears, and my mother would be aggravated because she was wasting time.

Going shopping with my Aunt Dolly was entirely different. The shopping became a learning experience, and it was fun, not a chore. As my aunt and I shopped, I got a lesson with everything we brought into the dressing room, and everything we left right on the rack.

First of all, if the material didn't feel good as we touched it with our fingers, then we knew that it probably wouldn't feel good when we tried it on. Exception to that rule was tulle, or what my aunt used to call "illusion netting." She said that only the finest tulle would do, and if you settled for the cheaper variety, then be prepared to be uncomfortable for the sake of style.

Second rule was to wear the clothes, rather than let the clothes wear you. "If someone can see you coming around the corner on a moon-less night, then you're probably wearing the wrong thing." I think I forgot that rule in the late 1980s and early 1990s, when a lot of the sweaters were covered in bright sequins. I don't think I wore those to my Aunt Dolly's house. Knowing her, she wouldn't have said anything, but she would've taken her sunglasses out of her purse and put them on as she spoke to me.

At one point during our shopping trip today, C had two tops in her hands and she held them up and said to her mom "Which of these would make you happy?" L didn't answer her daughter, and looked at me, as if for an answer. I quickly said to C-- Which one of those tops makes you happy?........ and C picked the first top that caught her eye, that made her smile, and that looked totally adorable with the little black skirt that she also picked out herself. Her mom preferred the second top, which was black, but C wanted some color on top of that black skirt, and I agreed with her, but I didn't say that.

I wish C's mom had looked at her daughter's face while she was trying on the clothes. When C had on the outfits that her mom picked out, C wasn't smiling.... her lips were shut tight, her eyes were all scrunched-up, and she came out of the dressing room without even looking in the mirror. And it wasn't because what her mom had picked out wasn't pretty--- it was just that what was picked out for her just simply wasn't her own 14-yr-old style.

When C walked out of the dressing room with the little black ruffled skirt and the light blue top with a few silver sparkles on it, she was just about floating.... twirling in the skirt to see how it looked.... touching the blue top because it was so soft... smiling from ear to ear and she was bright and bubbly, as C usually is. She found her own look and she loved it.

And that's what the shopping trip should be about. It's going to take a little extra time, because C is now at the age where she's finding her own sense of style, and that can change from month to month, from season to season. I would bet that an entire Mall filled with stores which are filled with all sorts of clothes is probably a little overwhelming for C. I suggested to C that she start cutting out pictures from magazines and the newspaper ads--- when she finds a "look" that she likes, cut it out and keep it in a folder or an envelope. When she goes shopping, she could take the pictures with her and find similar clothes that would give her the look that she likes.

C thought that was a good idea, and so did her mom. That wasn't my idea.... my Aunt Dolly gave me the same advice back in the 1960 when she and I would drive out to Green Acres Mall to go shopping for school and holiday clothes.

I have officially turned into my Aunt Dolly, I guess. Which isn't a bad thing at all. In fact, I can think of nothing better. As I've said many times, Aunt Dolly rocks.