(Cupcakes and other baked goods at Penelope)
After a certain age, I feel that we have a responsibility to our parents to make sure that they are not walking around in the world looking completely ridiculous, as clearly ones ability to judge the appropriateness of ones wardrobe diminishes with the aging process. Mom jeans, pleated khakis, orthopedic looking shoes can all be prevented with a little of our guidance! First up - new jeans to update the jeans that I had previously selected for mom and dad that have since faded and worn, but not in a way that would put them in the trendy "distressed" category. Standing in the men's section at the Gap, I began piling different styles and sizes of jeans into my dad's arms. Standard, Authentic, Straight, Easy, Loose, Bootcut - we got pairs of all of them except for the Skinny jeans, which are just wrong on most men and especially on one over the age of 60! I tossed my dad into a dressing room and paced around outside waiting for him to come out and model each pair. We settled on a couple workable fits and then began honing in on the correct size. It took about a half dozen trips back and forth from the jeans section (each time destroying the perfect stacks of denim) and enough pairs of jeans tried on to make the dressing room dude's head explode as I returned heaps of rejects, to find two pairs of perfect jeans. Mission accomplished!
(Falling into the Gap)
My mother, being very petite and very stubborn, was even more difficult to shop for and I braced for all the comments I knew would come my way: "It shows my belly", "It's too tight", "It's too long", "It's itchy", "It's too young", "It's too old", "Why is this thing here?" and so on! We attempted the petite section at Banana Republic, but came out empty handed. Then we headed over to Macy's, the most nightmarish department store on earth, which I typically avoid at all costs due to the number of frenzied tourists that overrun this place. But I dutifully accompanied my mother to the petite floor, determined to find at least SOMETHING she would like.
(Shopping with the elves)
We swept through the entire floor in search of jeans and my mother's beloved twin sets. And I kept losing my mom as she is so small I often lost her in and amongst the racks! She headed to the dressing room while I searched on, but when I went back there to find her I was confronted with a narrow hall of about 30 change rooms. I wandered through stopping at intervals semi-yelling "Moooom?" like a lost child. When I finally located her, she passed me a bunch of items she had already vetoed and I watched as she anxiously tugged at some sweater, self-conscious with her mid-section. "I need to lose this!" she complained as I wondered how many women her age are there really running around with six-packs. After MANY more trips around elf-land, we found some items (including jeans she didn't need to hem) that she loved.
We tried to pay but were trapped in line behind coupon lady - I'm all for a deal and the use of coupons, but you need to strategize the best payment methodology prior to getting in line! In addition to losing the ability to dress ones self, aging also causes one to not give a f**k what anyone else around them thinks and this was clearly this woman's attitude as she dealt cards and coupons like she was playing poker, while the line continued to grow behind her! The exasperated cashier punched in every possible permutation and combination of the fistful of coupons this nut-job had accumulated to purchase her pastel sweaters and dated looking floral things. In the end, the woman decided to split her haul into two separate purchases to save on taxes, which we were informed by the cashier resulted in savings of approximately 42 cents.
At the end of the day, mom and dad got some really nice things and my work is done - since I can't really monitor to make sure that they actually wear the stuff!
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