Two Snaps Up!

I don’t know if normal people have these – the clothes they should never wear out drinking.  When I was in college it was snap front western shirts.  Not that they didn’t look fly, because in my book, pigtails and a skinny mini 20 year old girl in an old pair of 501s and her motorcycle boots, they are begging for a snap front western shirt.  But those snaps… that ridiculously funny popping sound as you rip it open, it is too tempting.  At the time in my life that I sported a red WonderBra most days and a lean and mean 20 year old old body it wouldn’t necessarily have scared anyone, but it wasn’t always appropriate.  After several failed attempts at not ripping open my own shirt before evening’s end the snap front shirt went it in to the “Do Not Wear To Bars” side of the closet.

Now at my ripe old age of 36 I do not frequent bars and I do the majority of my boozing in the comfort of my own living room.  I rarely get very tuned up.  But as they say… it doesn’t take much.  And I have not one but two “Do Not Wear to Bars” skirts in frequent rotation.  They are genius in their construction.  Reversible and loaded with snaps.  (You can take the girl out of the bars but you can’t take her snaps!) A wrap around skirt with snaps all around, designed to fit   many sizes, the perfect item to purchase after a baby when my waist line was fluctuating.

So, yesterday I was in a foul mood.  I decided it was time to tell Sad to roll out.  I painted my toenails hot pink and I pulled out one of my Zand Amsterdam skirts.  I am heavily influenced by my costume.  In my 20s it was common for me to change my clothes four or five times in a night.  When my mood changes on the inside I need the outside to reflect it.  And when my inside is being stubborn sometimes I force the issue.

Happy Kelly in her Zand Amsterdam skirt, photobomb courtesy of Lucy Q

In my favorite skirt and my candy cane Converse I set out in to the world determined to keep a smile on my face.  We went to the dentist.  We ran a few errands.  And finally we headed to gymnastics.  Heavily caffeinated, I dipped in to the bathroom while Em got started in her gymnastics class.

The bathroom in her gymnasium is in the gym.  Lucy and I walked through the gym and Em waved at us.  I went in to the bathroom and was pleased.  It was really clean.  I let Lucy walk around in the stall.  I was exiting the stall and beginning to pat myself on the back for a successful trip to a public restroom with a walking ten and a half month old when I heard the zzzziiiippp sound.

My congratulations were too soon. Lucy had not put her hands in the toilet.  But she had managed to grab my skirt and remove the skirt from the belt.  I don’t know if you’ve ever been stuck in a winter coat because you opened up the zipper from the wrong end and you couldn’t pull the zipper back down but once you have a zipper split open it can take a minute or ten to get it straightened out.  Which would not really be a problem unless you were standing in a bathroom in your underpants chasing your kid from the toilet paper dispenser back to the plunger saying “Luuucy, Mommmmy needs to get her skirt back on! Don’t touch that!!  No, no, baby, stay right here!”

I frequently wonder if I am on Candid Camera.  Standing in my candy cane Converse and my underwear shouting at my wandering baby to please not put the plunger in her mouth was one of those moments in time.  There was definitely a moment before I fixed my zipper when I was planning my escape.  My poor, poor daughter.  She was going to be that kid in gymnastics that had the mother that appeared in the gym in her underwear.  And her candy cane Converse. She might not ever recover.

I fixed my skirt.   In between yelling at Lucy and fumbling with my zipper and imagining myself sprinting to the car with my sweater tied around my waist I was writing to you in my mind.  I can’t do something embarrassing behind closed doors.  It goes against every fiber of my being. Because while I was standing in my Converse and my underwear freaking out I wasn’t alone.  You were all there with me.  Now aren’t you lucky?

Sad has left the building.  Ridiculousness has taken its place.  Should be a fun few days.