I started dating Bill after my divorce but decided not to introduce him to my two sons until I was sure our relationship would last. One weekend, after the boys had left for their dad’s, Bill came over. He and I were in my bedroom, undressed, when I heard my older son’s voice outside the house. We jumped out of bed, grabbed our clothes from the pile on the floor, and threw them on. Then I ran to the living room, turned on the TV, and pretended to be watching it as my son opened the door. He’d forgotten his cleats for soccer practice.
When Bill walked into the room, I told my son, “This is Bill. He works with me and came by to pick up the schedule.”
Puzzled, my son said hello, found his cleats, and headed out. With a sigh of relief I turned to look at Bill. That’s when I saw he was wearing my “World’s Greatest Mom” T-shirt.
Victoria Collins
Ocala, Florida
My first professional job was working for the president pro tem of the Detroit City Council. One of my colleagues, Edwina, took me under her wing and explained the ins and outs of local politics. When my car broke down, she drove me to and from work. She helped me survive the workplace sexism of the 1980s.
One morning our boss called us into her office. She had an emergency and needed to go out of town. Edwina was to drive her to the airport, while I would replace her as the keynote speaker at a luncheon.
I looked down at my jeans and T-shirt. There wasn’t enough time to go home and change. Besides, I needed to figure out what I was going to say. Our boss usually spoke from notes scratched on a napkin.
Edwina had come to work in her usual attire: a pale-blue silk suit, a white blouse, and high heels to die for. She gestured for me to follow her to the ladies’ room.
“Here,” she said, taking off her suit jacket. “We’re the same size. Wear my clothes.”
We’ve been friends for more than forty years, and I’ve never forgotten how sophisticated I felt walking out of the bathroom in her suit. Edwina didn’t care that our boss had chosen me, not her, to give the speech. To her, clothes were simply a tool to help get the job done. I’d like to think that, because of her example, I’ve become more generous myself. Still, I confess, I wouldn’t mind having those heels.
Celeste Rabaut
West Bloomfield, Michigan
Every morning of my junior year of high school, my dad waited for me in the driveway while I tried on three different outfits. I could never seem to “girl” properly and wanted to pull my skin off when I tried. Mostly I wore my dad’s T-shirts, jogging pants, and wrestling shoes juxtaposed with wild pieces I’d designed and my mother had stitched for me: velvet knickers, barrel pants splashed with paint, a red-striped jumpsuit.
At school I attracted stares and whispers that I was gay, but also artsy friends who liked being different. Once, one of the popular girls looked me up and down in the bathroom mirror and muttered almost angrily, “Your clothes are so cool.” Some boys were surprisingly hostile. When a guy tried to get the attention of a group I was standing with and I turned around, he disgustedly said, “Not you! The pretty one.”
Things changed when I got a job as a public relations representative in the eighties. I learned to dress like a “career woman,” starving myself to fit into tiny skirts and jackets. Later, as a lonely stay-at-home mother, I tumbled headlong into evangelicalism and found that being thin and dyeing my hair blond got me the praise—especially from men—that I’d never received as a young nonbinary person. I was finally “girling” acceptably.
It took me decades and the rise of Christian nationalism to realize I didn’t want that praise after all. When my father died in 2018, most of our “church family” wouldn’t talk to me because I’d been publicly affirming of LGBTQ people. I felt as if everything good had died. For almost three years I wore black. Then I found a therapist and learned to let myself grieve. I gave my skirts and dresses away and found my way back to the sweatpants and trousers, flannels and sneakers that felt like home. I still go through three outfits most mornings, but when I leave the house, I’m dressed as myself.
Aimee French
Glenville, New York
On my high school swim team, getting to wear a tech suit was an honor. It meant you’d reached the final meet in sectionals, a regional division that included some of the most intense swim programs in the country. Our team was the scrappy underdog. Swimming in the final meet felt Olympics-level awesome—and meant that you got to participate in the meticulous ritual of getting into the tech suit before your race.
Tech suits typically cost a few hundred dollars each and are made of a material so delicate that a fingernail snag could destroy one. They are meant to be worn only a handful of times, so our team saved them for important races.
The suits are also painfully tight, which meant if you put yours on too early, you’d risk cutting off circulation to your extremities. But getting into the suit could take thirty minutes or more, so if you waited too long, you might miss your heat altogether.
The first step of getting into the suit was to wet and stretch it. After you stepped into the leg holes, your teammates helped. Centimeter by centimeter they pulled the fabric up your naked body, careful to use only their finger pads to prevent tears. Another teammate would stand by the locker-room door to provide updates on how many events were left before yours.
The hips and chest were the most challenging parts. Your assistants’ hands would begin to shake. “Work faster!” they’d snap at one another. Sometimes the lookout would run to the pool to give our anxious coach an update.
You might begin to panic at this point. What if you didn’t have time to warm up or to do your mental prep? Or, worse, what if the tech suit ripped? Would you have time to throw on your regular suit, with its low-tech fabric? Would you—
Then, with a satisfying snap of the shoulder straps, the tech suit was on. Relieved, your teammates slapped you on the ass and sent you on your way. Your next challenge awaited you in the pool.
Hannah Gage
Indianapolis, Indiana
In the last months of our marriage my wife and I slept in different rooms: she in our bedroom and I on a sofa in the basement. Each morning I would wake up early to make sure I was in the kitchen with a cup of coffee and a smile on my face when my daughter came downstairs. After my wife had showered and dressed, we would pass each other in silence as I headed to the bathroom. Over the prior months I had downloaded spyware onto her phone and snooped around the house in an attempt to determine the extent of her infidelities, which included sleeping with several colleagues and a man we had hired to remodel our bathroom.
One morning, after I showered and brushed my teeth, I looked into the bedroom, where my wife was getting dressed with her bare back to the door, and I was overcome with despair. I let my towel fall as I came up behind her and held her body against mine, thinking, It’s OK. I forgive you. I love you. She stiffened and arched away. All the pain we had inflicted upon each other couldn’t be dispelled so easily. We had gone too far to come back. As she continued getting dressed, I went downstairs, put on my clothes, kissed my daughter goodbye, and drove to work. That was the last time my ex-wife and I ever touched.
Name Withheld
My aunt slips her arm through mine as we follow my mother and my other aunts into the funeral home. I’ve never had to say goodbye to a loved one until today. Now I must help get my grandmother ready for the viewing. The smell in the funeral home’s front room makes my skin crawl. I ask why we can’t let the mortician get Grandma ready. Just then, he opens the door and says, “You may attend to her.”
Grandma is wearing the violet dress Mama chose. All of us quietly weep as we gather around the matriarch who carried some of us in her womb and all of us in her arms, who gave up years of her life for her family to teach us how to do the same.
We brush her white hair the way she liked it, rub lotion into the paper-thin skin of her hands, fasten the pearl buttons on her sleeves, and drape her favorite gold necklace around her neck. My youngest aunt swipes bright-pink rouge along her cheeks.
The older aunts tsk at her. “Why would you choose that shade?”
Mama agrees. “She wouldn’t be caught dead wearing that color.”
We freeze at her choice of words. Mama inhales sharply and puts her hand over her mouth. Then we all laugh until tears roll down our cheeks.
After we’ve regained our composure, we admire Grandma’s outfit and hair. I whisper to her that she looks lovely. We stand around her, hold hands, and say goodbye.
Alyssa Lance
Longmont, Colorado
Thirty years ago I started going naked at home and wherever else it was allowed: parties, nude beaches, hot tubs. I’m just one of those people who prefer being nude. I’ve never loved how I look or feel in clothes. Getting dressed feels like a chore.
Recently I began renting a house from a friend of mine. One morning he texted to let me know he and a contractor would be coming over in a few minutes to look at the porch. Standing in the living room with nothing on, I laughed and thought, That was a close one. I threw on a dress from the collection that I keep draped over doors and chairs in case someone drops by.
I texted my friend back, “Good thing I saw your message. You almost saw me naked. It’s just a matter of time.”
J.F.
Portland, Oregon
Even as a toddler my daughter went all in on her outfits. Each night Jane would lay out her ensemble for the next day: a top, pants or a skirt, and shoes, plus a beaded necklace or colorful scarf or tiara from her dress-up box. She called it “making a little Janey out of clothes.” Then she’d pull odds and ends out of my closet to make a “little mommy.”
In the morning Jane would beg me to wear the outfit she’d chosen for me, but I always said no. I couldn’t imagine myself pulling up to the preschool wearing an old bridesmaid dress, a puffy jacket, and a straw beach hat.
Jane’s crusade to dress me lasted only a few months. I don’t regret much as a parent, but I wish that, just once, I’d said yes.
Jody Casella
Columbus, Ohio
My husband is a few years into dementia, and though he is still capable of most activities, getting dressed has become difficult. It’s not the act itself but the concept of putting on clothes that causes him consternation: “Aren’t I just going to take them off again?” His anxiety about getting dressed is so great that it seeps into conversations about other things, like an upcoming get-together.
“Will they do the ‘five stages’ too?” he asks. The “five stages” is how he sometimes refers to getting dressed.
“Will our friends also be dressed?” I say. “Yes, of course.”
Our exchanges while he’s dressing himself sometimes develop into arguments.
“I’ve never seen this shirt before,” he says. “I don’t understand why they’ve changed everything.”
“Capitalism,” I say with a sigh.
“Why are you making me do this? I’m not going to do it anymore.”
“You’re not going to get dressed anymore? OK, how will you go outside? Or have people over?”
“I’m going to get dressed; I’m just not going to build it your way.”
“Fine!” I have no “way,” but we have developed some techniques that make certain items of clothing easier to put on.
At night he might take off his pants, only to put them back on in a minute, forgetting which direction he is going. I’m embarrassed to admit that I often snap at him. “Down! Down! Toward the floor!” Finally the clothes come off.
On nights that are particularly difficult, when he is finally unclothed, he sometimes looks at me and asks, “Are you telling me that people do this every day?”
Name Withheld
The jacket is black lambskin leather with silver zippers on the arms and a buckle on the collar. Edgy and badass, it is an anomaly amongst the flowy skirts and bulky sweaters filling my closet. I bought it on a group tour in Morocco, during a visit to a tannery. After watching the workers scrape hides and stir vats of dye, our group was led to the gift shop, which was crammed floor to ceiling with leather products.
A jacket caught my eye. I tried to tell myself I didn’t need a souvenir, but one of the salesmen persuaded me to try it on. It was too small.
“C’est la vie!” I said.
“No, no. I have one that fits.” He pulled another jacket from the rack and helped me into it. The sleeves hit just at my wrists; the bottom hem, right above my hips. The leather was buttery soft. The jacket looked like it had been made for me.
The salesman said, “It is 400 dirhams, but as you are a very special guest, I offer it to you for 350.”
The price was too much. I took one last look at the cool new version of myself in the mirror and slipped the jacket off.
When I rejoined my group, our guide, Mustafa, wanted to know what price the salesman had asked for the jacket. I told him.
“You can get it for 220, 230 tops,” Mustafa said. “Start at 200 and hold your ground.”
I went back and haggled with the salesman, who acted like I was taking food from the mouths of his children but eventually dropped the price to 230. Mustafa gave me a high five.
After the tour ended, I stayed in Morocco on my own, haggled with more vendors, rode a hot-air balloon along the Atlas Mountains, drove a 4x4 across the desert, and stayed in a casbah at what felt like the edge of civilization. Whenever I slip the jacket on, that feeling of power comes back to me.
Amy Lundeberg
Sacramento, California
Sunbathing was the norm when I was growing up: Put on a two-piece swimsuit, slather yourself with baby oil, and lie out in the backyard until you turned a fashionable tan.
When frying ourselves, my sisters and I had a system: We would hang sheets and blankets on the clothesline to shield us from view and keep our shirts and pants next to us. The moment we heard our father’s tractor coming back from the fields, we jumped up and got dressed, lest he accuse us of being lazy and indecent. We would sunbathe only on days when he was plowing or harvesting. The rest of the time we played the parts of good Catholic girls, doing endless chores and covering our tempting bodies. But on occasion, if we got distracted or didn’t hear our father’s approach, he would catch us. His icy stare and palpable contempt meant we had sinned, and no amount of work would be penance enough.
Nowadays, when my sisters and I get together, our husbands talk about how none of us can sit still. We push ourselves even when we’re exhausted. We have all struggled with body image. Though we laugh when we tell stories about sunbathing—debating which sin was worse, being a sloth or dressing immodestly—our father’s judgment still hangs in the air.
C.H.
Portland, Oregon
My mother regularly told me that I was born a night owl, making my entrance into the world well after midnight and staying up late from the time I was a baby.
Starting school did little to change my preferences. I was enrolled at St. John the Evangelist, a Catholic school that started at 7:30 in the morning and had a strict dress code. The girls’ uniform consisted of a navy-and-gray plaid wool jumper, a white button-down blouse, a navy crossover tie, navy knee socks, and black shoes.
I hated that uniform. The wool jumper was itchy, the blouse had to be ironed with starch, the knee socks left painful indentations on my shins, and the shoes were as hard as bricks. But as much as I despised the uniform, I hated getting up early for school even more.
So I formulated a plan that would allow me to sleep in: That night, instead of putting on my pajamas, I dressed in my uniform, lay supine on the bed, straightened the pleats of my jumper, and placed my arms away from my sides to avoid crinkling my blouse. Lying motionless proved uncomfortable, and without a blanket covering me I was freezing, but I refused to admit my scheme was flawed. I fell asleep calculating how much extra snooze time I would gain.
I woke in a panic. I’d been so caught up in my plan that I’d forgotten to set my alarm! I jumped out of bed and hurried downstairs. At least I was already dressed.
I was packing up my breakfast when my mom came into the kitchen and asked what I was doing.
“I’m taking breakfast to go because I forgot to set my alarm,” I told her. “But, get this genius move, Mom: Last night I slept in my uniform so I wouldn’t have to get up so early!”
She cackled and told me to check the clock. It was 2:30 in the morning.
I went back upstairs, set my alarm, and changed into my pajamas.
Maureen Whittemore
Kaunakakai, Hawaii
During my childhood my father would relax on the couch after work, pen and crossword in hand, his slippers parked on the floor next to him. We had a long-standing game in which I would sneak up, steal his slippers, and hide them so that he had to search the house to retrieve them.
When I really stumped my dad, he’d say, “One day I’ll trick you. It might be a long time in the future, but mark my words, I’ll get you back.”
On a glorious afternoon the summer I turned twenty-nine, my friends and family gathered in an oak grove overlooking a quiet lake. In the bridal cabin I was encircled by my bridesmaids as we all sang, “Goin’ to the chapel and we’re gonna get ma-a-a-rried,” and my mother buttoned me into my ivory lace gown. My hair was twisted up, my veil in place, and my makeup expertly applied. My sister handed me the shoebox containing the finishing touch to my ensemble: elegant gold-and-rhinestone wedge-heeled sandals. When I lifted the lid, I found no gold sandals. I was staring at my dad’s shabby black sheepskin slippers. Realizing I’d finally been had, I looked out the cabin window and saw my dad erupting in laughter.
Caitie Shaughnessy
Ann Arbor, Michigan
For eighteen years, from November to April, I got up every morning and pulled on long underwear, a turtleneck, a wool shirt, a fleece jacket, a down vest, thick sweatpants, wool socks, and down booties. I called it my “system,” and it ensured I’d be warm in any room of the poorly insulated, cinder-block house my then-husband and I rented. When we moved in, we removed the landlord’s miniature woodstove and installed a full-size one, but my husband decided we would light it only in the evenings to save money. During the day the house often stayed between forty-five and fifty degrees.
At the time I took pride in keeping heating costs low and not being reliant on what I considered an ecologically unsustainable American need for full-time comfort. Plus, I could walk to the mailbox without needing to put on a coat.
Then my husband and I moved to an even colder climate, where overnight temps occasionally dipped to negative twenty-five degrees in winter. The house we’d bought had a propane boiler and in-floor radiant heat, but my husband decided we would keep the thermostat at fifty. We dressed in layers each morning, removing some during the day as the sun warmed the house, then layered up again at night. I was physically comfortable, but there was a growing chill inside me.
After my husband decided to go solo, I lived alone for five years and continued to keep the heat low and bundle up indoors. Then I fell in love with a man who, along with other wonderful qualities, can build or fix seemingly anything. Before he moved in, he installed a woodstove. Every winter morning when I get up, he already has a fire glowing. On Saturday evenings we relax in the barrel sauna he built at the edge of our woods. But the real warmth that fills my days is the way we make every decision together.
G.F.
Crestone, Colorado
Eager to make a good impression at the CEO’s yard party, I primped and tried on outfits for hours, striving for the perfect look. Meanwhile my husband spent the afternoon mowing the lawn and talking sports with a neighbor. Thirty minutes before the party, I waited in the car, fearing we’d be late, while he showered and dressed.
“What took you so long?” I asked when he slid behind the wheel, finger combing his damp hair.
“I didn’t know what to wear.”
I sized up his outfit: a pale-blue oxford shirt and jeans. I wondered if I should have spent more of my day planning his look.
On the drive over, a car in front of us stopped suddenly, and I grabbed my husband’s thigh in surprise. That’s when I felt the familiar poly-cotton-elastane fabric of the pants he had on. I gasped when I saw the slight flare below the knee, intended to visually balance body proportions and flatter all figures: My husband had unknowingly put on my mid-rise, boot-cut, stretch-denim jeans.
“What’s so funny?” he asked when I started to laugh.
Unable to answer, I laughed until I cried and even peed a bit. Even after I recovered, I decided not to tell him. It was too late to go home for him to change, and if he knew he was wearing my pants, he’d refuse to attend the party.
When we arrived, I checked the visor mirror to make sure I looked presentable, only to find my mascara had run down my cheeks. I sighed, threw open the car door, and with raccoon eyes and pee-dampened panties, made my grand entrance on the arm of a man wearing women’s stretch jeans. Unless the CEO was as clueless as my husband, I had no chance of making a good impression, but I knew I would make a lasting one.
Donna Landi
Sleepy Hollow, New York
In May of 1968 I traveled from my Ohio college to Indiana to campaign for Robert F. Kennedy in the Democratic presidential primary. The campaign organizers arranged for me to bunk with a group of girls at a liberal arts college, where the sort of curfews and rules that governed my school were nonexistent. Their room was strewn with clothes and record albums from groups I’d never heard of, like the Velvet Underground and the Serpent Power.
I was in awe of one of the girls, Sally. Her hair stretched down her back, and her skirt barely grazed her thighs. As we dressed for our first day of campaigning, she announced, “I’m wearing a bra for Bobby today.”
Did that mean she didn’t wear a bra on other days?
Bra-wearing was not mandated by my college rulebook, but there was no need. We wore bras, and lipstick, and garter belts to hold up our stockings. Sally put on a bra so she would appear respectable as she campaigned; I kept mine on because I couldn’t imagine doing otherwise.
Kennedy won the Indiana primary, and I went home for the summer, where my mother woke me one morning with uncharacteristic tenderness to tell me that Kennedy had been assassinated the night before.
That September women protesting the Miss America pageant in Atlantic City, New Jersey, brought out a “freedom trash can” and tossed in bras, girdles, makeup, and other trappings of female life. Soon after, I moved to New York City, where braless women were everywhere. I soon became one of them. This was women’s liberation. Even after my braless state had become an everyday reality, I felt the occasional frisson of delight to be free of straps, hooks, and cups.
In the mid-1970s, as I approached my thirtieth birthday, I decided I needed to get serious about a career. I bought a few blazers and dug my bras out of the dresser. My breasts remained ensconced in public for the next several decades.
This past June the anniversary of Robert Kennedy’s death got the usual mentions in the media. I read them with sadness. One day, when the temperature flirted with ninety, I took off my bra before going out to run errands. There was only a slight breeze, but my emancipated breasts were cool. Unconstrained, I made my stride jaunty, for Bobby and for me.
Fredda Rosen
New York, New York
I had to relearn how to dress myself at the age of twenty-eight. I don’t remember my physical therapist’s name, but I will never forget the stick grabber he brought into my hospital room. Stepping into pajama bottoms or raising my arms to put on a T-shirt was exhausting, but it was trying to use the grabber to put my socks on that made me cry out in frustration.
I had survived not only septic shock but also coding twice during surgery, not to mention fourteen years as an alcoholic. I thought putting something on my feet would be the least of my worries.
My PT described how to use the grabber to hook the sock onto my toes. I managed to do that much but struggled with the rest. With every inch I moved, my body felt like glass exploding. When the sock missed my heel for the fifth time, I yelled, “Fuck it!” and cried for only the third time during my hospital stay. My PT assured me the pain would be temporary.
I was released from the hospital after six weeks. Before I was discharged, I took one last lap around the hallways with my nurses, carefully placing one foot in front of the other, wearing bright-blue flip-flops. No socks.
Bianca Bourgault
Jay, Maine
My mother takes me to the old-lady boutique in Beverly Hills to buy an outfit for court. My attorney has told her to dress me in something conservative. As the plaintiff I’m supposed to look respectable, not like the tie-dyed, teenage Deadhead I aspire to be. We leave with skirts, tops, and an eraser-pink blazer.
For the first day of the trial I put on a baby-blue plaid skirt, a matching sweater, and the blazer. My mother secures my grandmother’s pearls around my neck. I don’t feel like myself as I clack up the courthouse steps in my new heels. This is it. After three years, one forensic psychiatrist, two therapists, four depositions, and dozens of doctors, I will finally face the defendant and tell my story, and the experience will heal me.
Inside, the defense lawyers strut down the hall. The female associate they’ve picked to question me eyes me with suspicion. During the depositions I met her questions with steely reserve. I’m sure she thinks I’m a liar.
A man in a plaid suit whispers in my counselor’s ear, and my mother and I are banished to a bench while both sets of attorneys hustle into the courtroom.
After a while, my lawyer exits triumphantly. He’s made a deal. There will be no trial.
Realizing I won’t get my day in court, I begin to sob. The female defense attorney walks by, and I see her expression change from smugness to surprise. Maybe now she realizes the pain her client caused.
Later I put on jeans and boots to meet up with friends and get drunk.
For the next four decades I’m like a flame, blazing through life. Though I find few opportunities to dress like a Beverly Hills matron, I hold on to the eraser-pink blazer, calling on it whenever I need to tamp down the exuberant girl inside me.
Karin Elstad
Santa Monica, California
I started my fashion career in the nineties, working in visual display for a chain store in Manhattan. There was nothing creative about the job: I dressed mannequins to match pictures from the corporate office. Most of my days were spent ironing in the basement. I adopted a work uniform—army-green pants, black boots, and a black long-sleeve T-shirt—that I wore no matter the weather.
One day two men approached me on the sales floor and said they liked my look. They worked for an Italian designer who needed a new display person. Would I come in for an interview? I remember well what I wore for that occasion: black Dickies pants, a black cable-knit sweater, black boots, and a thrifted black trench coat. I carried my grandmother’s red floral parasol (it was raining) and my grandfather’s plaid bowling bag. None of these choices make sense to me now. Yet, walking up Fifth Avenue to the interview, I felt like a supermodel.
I was given a test: create mannequin outfits based on photos from a runway show. Working alone in an empty fitting room, I struggled to zip up a pair of silk pants and tore them. Freaking out inside, I nonchalantly sauntered over to the accessories department and found a chain mail sling bag I could artfully arrange over the tear.
For days afterward I kept expecting a call asking me to pay for the damaged pants. Instead they called to offer me the job.
Michael Quinn
Brooklyn, New York
In the late seventies, men’s wedding fashion was dominated by flared trousers, ruffled shirts, and big bow ties. My wife-to-be, René, decided that I should wear a white tux. I said I would, but only if I could also wear white gloves. She agreed but drew the line when I suggested a white top hat would, well, top off my attire.
The afternoon of the big day I drove my Chevette to the church to meet René for a pre-wedding photo shoot. I was singing along to Neil Young, my tux hanging from a hook in the back seat, when something dawned on me: I had fire-engine-red, satin bikini underwear on under my Levi’s. I couldn’t wear red underwear with white pants.
I drove to my friend Pat’s house. An usher in the wedding, he was already wearing his ruffled shirt and striped trousers when he answered the door.
“I need to borrow underwear,” I said.
“Did you get so nervous you shit your pants?”
I shook my head. “I’m wearing red bikinis.”
Pat burst out laughing. “Hold on,” he said and disappeared upstairs. He returned with a clean pair of tighty-whities. “I don’t want them back,” he said.
Leaving my friend to ponder my ineptitude, I drove to the church, changed into my “something borrowed,” and got hitched.
Mark Munger
Fredenberg Township, Minnesota
At ten years old I roll out of bed and pad to the bathroom for a quick pee, then slide on my underwear, shorts, and Brownie T-shirt. Total time getting dressed: two minutes.
At eighty years old I first talk myself into sitting up in bed, then linger until an internal urgency forces me to waddle to the bathroom. Carefully I lower myself to the comfort-height toilet seat and finish the deed. To rise, I rock back and forth, then command my legs to push me up. At last I am standing. Next I put on my panties. First I tap my right thigh and right calf to remind them to be strong. Then I lift my left leg as quickly as I can, which is pretty slow, and slip my foot through the leg hole. Whew. I congratulate myself and rest before attempting the right foot. Success. My pants are next: same process, except at times my feet catch on the stretchy material, causing me to teeter. If I’m lucky, a foot will make it through all in one go.
If you’re wondering why I don’t just sit down to put my pants on, it’s because of my friend’s mother, Mae, who lived by the motto “As long as I can put on my panties standing up, I know I’m OK.” She did so into her nineties. If she could do it, so can I.
Bonnie Johnson
Nashville, Tennessee
In seventh grade I transferred to an online school and realized that it didn’t matter what I put on each morning. I was just sitting on my bed all day, doing my assignments. So I dropped getting dressed from my morning routine. Then I dropped the morning routine altogether and started sleeping until the afternoon. When my family began commenting on my poor hygiene and weight gain, I realized I might be depressed.
I eventually moved on from this low point, but in tenth grade the cycle started again: I’d wake up late and stay in bed for hours. I started to skip my medications, which only made me want to lie in bed more. Putting on clothes seemed impossible. And why should I get dressed if no one even wanted me around?
Junior year was brighter. Then, as a senior, I went through my first breakup, and the cycle returned. This time I noticed it more quickly and tried to stop it by making plans with people to force myself out of bed. Slowly things got better.
Now that I’m a freshman in college, I look forward to getting dressed. It means going out to see my friends, meals filled with conversation, and impromptu road trips. It means that I finally feel loved by the people around me.
S.E.
Valdosta, Georgia
At the age of sixty-six I began seeing a new therapist, hoping to finally embrace my wish to become a woman. For decades I had dealt with depression and suicidal thoughts. My previous therapists, all male, had dismissed my desire to wear female clothing as a “sexual fetish.” I’d been too ashamed to argue with them.
My new therapist was not only a specialist in gender identity but also a woman. Until then I’d been avoiding seeing a woman, the same way I never read books by female authors or about female characters.
One day I sat in her waiting room ready to surprise her with an advancement I’d made: I was dressed as a woman for the first time in public. My face was made up, and I wore a silky blouse, dress pants, jewelry, and a wig to cover my male-pattern baldness.
Instead of greeting me, she asked with a confused look, “Can I help you?”
“It’s me!” I said.
The smile that lit up her face still warms the heart of this happier-than-ever, seventy-four-year-old woman.
Cyril Hinds
Middletown, California
In 2024 I walked a portion of the Camino de Santiago in Spain. One of the best parts was the simplicity of my days: hiking, eating, sleeping, and carrying everything I needed in my pack. I had three pairs each of pants, socks, and underwear, along with three shirts and a change of shoes for the evenings. I would wear one set of clothes to walk, change for dinner, and wear the third set the next day.
I once read about how President Obama eschewed day-to-day choices, like what color suit to wear, so he could focus on more-important issues. On the Camino I lived by this philosophy, which freed my mind to experience every beautiful moment: a red-and-pink sunrise after days of rain, a stream with green fronds swaying in its current, the taste of a tomato on crusty bread topped with olive oil.
Responsibilities, decisions, and more-stylish outfits awaited me at home. Unencumbered for two glorious weeks, I was able to get lost in the sights and sounds that surrounded me.
Carlea Bauman
Fairfax, Virginia
I became a physician at the start of the COVID pandemic. We didn’t know yet how the virus spread, and I feared carrying it home on my scrubs. After each shift I’d grab clean scrubs from the hospital’s communal stack, lay paper towels on the floor in the bathroom, and wiggle into the fresh garments in a grim version of Don’t Touch the Lava! Once home I’d strip by the door and sprint to the shower.
Sometimes in the mornings I donned earrings to brighten up my hospital attire—silver spirals, slabs of turquoise and gold—but they kept getting caught in my masks and PAPR hoods, so I stopped. Then, more out of profound weariness than precaution, I gave up my tie-dyes and polka dots and florals and began wearing scrubs on my days off from work. Between COVID and my medical residency, I was exhausted and knew it. But it wasn’t until after the pandemic that I could truly see how muted my life had become.
My post-pandemic closet is full of burnt umber, eggplant, and forest green. “Wear this, Mama!” my toddler chirps, pointing to a dress dappled with multicolored flowers: his favorite, and mine. For himself he chooses an orange, pink, and green top that he calls his “rainbow shirt.” If someday his world should turn gray, I hope he holds on to his love of color.
Hanna Saltzman
Salt Lake City, Utah
