I recently came across an article in the newspaper which had a term that was new to me. It referred to a store which sold ‘disposable clothing.’ The article did not mean a paper dress that was thrown away after one use, but a whole store of clothing that, while very trendy, is also very poorly made. They are meant to last for only one season, and then be tossed. My grandmother would be horrified.
I was the oldest in a long line of grandchildren and thus, whatever she bought for me was going to have a long march as it wended its way down through all my decreasingly younger cousins. Therefore, when I was taken out to buy a winter coat it was made of sturdy wool with a good lining. That coat, when I was younger, also came with a wool hat and leggings, an unknown item of clothing today. (For those who do not know what leggings looked like back in the day, check out the accompanying picture of a Simplicity pattern from the 1950s.) When the current wearer of a particular item of clothing had outgrown it, her parent would see that it was dry cleaned, as well as any necessary repairs accomplished such as button replacement, before it was handed on to the next in line. Thus it zig zagged its way through a number of families until it finally went, exhausted, to the Salvation Army.
My grandmother took great pleasure in this process which belied her own childhood. She had been raised in a wealthy Chicago family, with a nanny, maids, and summer trips to Europe. Yet, she had a great sense of respecting what she owned. She would never have gone as far as the current organizing guru Marie Kondo does, of thanking an item for its service before getting rid of it, but she wanted things to be used well. I remember the spring ritual of carefully packing away the winter woolens in a trunk with moth balls (another unknown item today) to await their resurrection in the fall. That sharp smell of camphor can still bring back that open trunk, and the carefully preserved clothing being placed inside.
One’s childhood memories are, of course, blurry and uninformed by adult realities, but it seems to me in memory that on cold winter days when we walked home from an outing, my grandmother was always in the same winter coat with the large buttons down the front and two generous square pockets on either side. I do not remember the color, but I am sure it must have been made of wool, well lined, and smelling slightly of moth balls.
