The era of thrift is returning, but it'll still be a while before those 40-somethings start darning their socks. For me, of course, the era of thrift never left. Some part of me still follows the guidelines of "How to Live on Practically Nothing" a book that was my bible during graduate school and then again when I was on my own with three kids in Denver. Roz Chast, the New Yorker cartoonist, once showed a woman hanging washed plastic bags on her clothesline. The tag was something like, "When the environmentally conscious meet the perennially thrifty." I saw nothing funny in that cartoon; that was my life.
Perhaps this background information will help you understand my story. I own four sweatshirts. Not one of them is less than ten years old. Although I've tried to keep the stains to a minimum, the cuff and waistband ribbings are looking very shabby, and the neck ribbing of my grey one is permanently soiled. So, though I hated the very idea of it, I decided to splurge: I would buy myself a new sweatshirt and pitch all four of my current ones. Would I actually be able to do that? To throw away four sweatshirts?
The search began. I hate to shop, but I did actually go into a shop to look for a sweatshirt. The closest things they had were zippered fleece garments of 100% polyester, made in China. I couldn't make myself buy one.
At first, I thought maybe I'd cut off and save the logos from the three of my four sweatshirts that have words on them. (The fourth one is the oldest, a coral-pink colour that I love, despite the fact that it has stretched to well beyond a flattering length.)
My black sweatshirt says, "Napoleon." I bought it in a fit of enthusiasm and chauvinism after we saw the premier of a locally written and produced Broadway-bound musical about Napoleon. It closed in London later (before Broadway), so I figure my sweatshirt is a collector's item.
My grey sweatshirt is from my home town, bought in 2004 when I attended my fiftieth high school reunion. In appliquéd black and gold cursive, it says, "Delphi Oracles." I keep it not from nostalgia but from the still-unrealized hope that some day someone will say, "Why do you have a sweatshirt cheering on the Greek seers?"
And the purple sweatshirt, the one with the tattered ribbing, says, "Basketry Focus 1995," a souvenir of the international conference of basket makers that our local Basketry Network hosted all those years ago. I keep it—well, why do I keep it? To remind me, perhaps, of the ragged cuticles I sported during those five years when I made baskets from dyed and dampened reeds.
So you can see why, despite their shabbiness now, I am a bit reluctant to replace any of these with some polyester, made-in-China upstart. I marched all of them into the sewing room and attacked them with my best fabric scissors. Off came the black ribbing. Without a qualm I lopped off the sleeve cuffs of all four shirts. The neck ribbing of my Delphi Oracles shirt is now in the trash.
Some people, before undertaking this drastic surgery, might have gone to the fabric cupboard to check the supplies. I know I have several lengths of ribbings left from a period 15 years ago when I sewed with knits. But I actually have no idea at all what I will use—what colors, what widths—to refurbish these old sweatshirts. So for the moment they sit on the cutting table, naked without their ribbings but open to any and all expectations of new life. Soon there will be a renaissance of sweatshirts on my shelf, logos intact, testaments to my thrift, ingenuity, and just plain pig-headedness.
Copyright 2010 Ann Tudor
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