When I was little, I loved to play dress up in the most outlandish stuff I could find in my mom’s closet. Feathers: yes! Gold: yes! Fringe: yes! I can’t think of anything more exciting than draping myself in layers of her costume jewelry and slipping on some fancy shoes that were many sizes too big for me. I would paw through multiple jewelry boxes and three drawers full of elaborate costume jewelry to find the perfect pairings. Her large walk-in closet was not only full of fabulous frocks but shoes in clear, plastic boxes, hats, wigs on Styrofoam wig heads and shelves of purses. It was a magical place that sometimes still visits me in my dreams.
Then something happened…grade school. All I wanted to do was to fit in and be like everyone else. I went to a private school and we wore uniforms, so it was challenging to express yourself through clothes. Then one year, rabbit fur coats were all the rage. I fell in love with the bomber style jacket with ribbed waist and cuffs, and a hood with drawstrings that culminated in large bunny fur pom poms.
It seemed like ALL of my friends had one. I wanted a white one more than anything on earth and I made it abundantly clear that it would be just fine with me if that was the only thing I got for Christmas. I was pretty sure it was going to happen even though I was told I wasn’t getting one. I mean, isn’t that what your parents tell you when they are trying to surprise you and you guess the surprise?
When Christmas rolled around, there was no coat under the tree. Then I thought, “Wait! this is so special, I bet I will be presented with it on my birthday!” A few days after Christmas, my birthday had come and gone and no coat. I pleaded with my mom, “why can’t I just have this one thing?” Her response, “why don’t you wear my mink jacket, its fur?” And I thought “A. You are missing the point and B. Are you kidding me? I’m not going to wear some mink granny coat and be the laughingstock of my grade school.”
After a few months of lamenting the loss of something I never had, Spring came, and I moved on to the next ridiculous trend of wearing boy’s plaid boxer shorts rolled down at the waist and I forgot about my rabbit fur heartbreak.
One day recently, I thought about that rabbit fur coat and the struggle I experienced as a child not getting the one thing I wanted for Christmas. In those days, without social media and cable TV, we were blissfully unaware of how much worse things could be or were for other families. I likely had 20 other gifts under the tree, so I hadn’t been neglected, just self-centered. Perhaps I didn’t get the coat because we couldn’t afford it (which never actually stopped anyone in my family from spending $) but just maybe my mother didn’t get me the coat because she didn’t want me to be like everyone else. Maybe she liked my unique way of pulling things together and wanted me to be an individual, blaze my own fashion trail, not follow the trends. Maybe she wanted me to be different, like I was when I was little and didn’t care what anyone thought of me.
After all these years, I have finally come back to little Mel’s way of thinking, which may be a little out there at times, but it grants me the permission to be who I’m comfortable being and I believe that is the greatest gift I could ever ask for.
XOXO-
Mel
P.S. I wish I had her mink “granny” jacket now…