CLOTHES
We weren't rich, but we had everything we wanted; we were the Blake girls, and
people thought we were rich. I remember being in homeroom and a boy sitting
behind me said, "You must be rich. All your clothes match."
Shopping for school clothes in August, we bought winter and fall
things: sweaters, wool skirts, long-sleeve blouses, and wool jumpers. We didn't
plan on its perhaps being hot, and even
if it was, we didn't care. We wore these clothes anyway. It amazes me when I
think that we wore high heels all day in high school.
One year, Doreen had
this sleeveless dress with matching heels and a pocketbook. I couldn't wait to
wear it. When I did, I felt as if everyone was looking at me. Doreen had a
friend, Pat Kimbler, who told me once, "you are the prettiest of you three
sisters." I thought of that often.
We got new clothes for school and
for summer. We got at least three outfits to start school, and as Doreen
and I grew up being close to the same size, we would match our clothes up,
getting more outfits by doing this. The first one up in the morning
got the first pick of our clothes, along with many an argument when Doreen
arrived at the morning bus stop to see me wearing what she was going to wear. I
think I invented the phrase, "you snooze, you lose."
Dad had a brother, Uncle Wes, who had
two girls: Cheree, who was three years older than Doreen, and Pat, who was two
years older than Cheree. Every so often, Uncle Wes would bring boxes of clothes
they had grown out of, and we would dig in to find something new to wear. We
looked forward to these boxes.
Back when we went to school, you
couldn't wear pants, only dresses and skirts…in only the latest fashion. We
were hot stuff.
As we became teenagers, we each had our
own style. Doreen would sit in the chair in the living room every morning
spraying and teasing her hair until it was huge. This was the style of the
1960s.
My hair was short, a little teased into
the style known as “the artichoke.” I wore it this way all through high school.
We also had eye shadow---the bluer, the better---and of course, lipstick, in
pink and almost white.
I remember when we were allowed to
wear straight skirts. That was a big event. I was in the eighth grade when
I got my first straight skirt, gray. I loved it.
When we started to baby-sit and earn
our own money, we started to shop without Mom. Doreen and I would go to
Newburgh when she got her driver’s license.
I had three families I baby-sat for on
a regular basis. Doreen didn't do baby-sitting much, because at 16 she got a
part-time job as a cashier in the same local store, Chaffee’s, our mom worked
at. In years to come, so did Nancy and I.
Doreen and I went shopping for our prom
dresses. It was her Junior Prom, and my date, Kenny, was a junior, too. Our
dresses came from Hollywood Togs on Water Street. This was the shop to go to.
The day of the Prom, Doreen and I went
to Newburgh to Fred and George's Salon. Everyone went there---and the bigger,
the better for your hair-do. It was so stiff!
Nancy and I would watch on
television in the morning Miss Frances and Ding Dong School.
She would show us how to care for our babies---our dolls---bathing, powdering,
and changing them. We did a great job caring for them, except when I left mine
in the basement; when I found it, some of the fingers had been chewed off by a
mouse. I felt terrible for Tiny Tears. I had left her alone with this creature.
Thinking of clothes for our dolls reminded me of, I
believe it was the winter, of first grade: I wore a corduroy skirt, with a
crinoline and a slip under it. This was a very cold and windy day, and my legs
were frozen, and that slip scratched the inside of my legs so badly that by the
end of the day I was in tears, vowing never again to wear that slip on a cold
day.
The material of this slip was like a netting, and it reminds
me that many years later Nancy became friends with a girl across the street
from her in Walden; we call her “FiFi,” but her name is really
Claudette. We
have all gone out to eat together or she has been invited to a party at Nancy's
house or at Claudine‘s. She is a dear soul, funny and very easy to get to know,
but a real fashion designer in her own right. Many times she has been in some
outfit wrapped in the same kind of netting material as my slip, but she has
many colors of it.
In my mother's bedroom, there was a
cabinet in the corner and there were two brown corduroy jackets and matching
hats. I remember wearing this jacket and hat. I love that outfit. It looked so
cute!
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We are serializing Kathleen Blake Shields's heart-warming book, Home is Where the Story Begins: Memoir of a Happy Childhood. Published last fall, it is available from Outskirts Press and from online booksellers like amazon.com and bn.com. I'm proud to have coached Kathy and edited her book. My web site is http://WriteYourBookWithMe.com
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