Scratchy Sweater Dress Friday Round-Up

I had a turtleneck, long sleeve, midi-length sweater dress that made me feel like a million bucks until the end of the day when I went screaming into my house to get it off. This was quite some time ago but I just saw an ad for a sweater dress on Facebook that brought back the bravado and the misery of my sweater dress of old. You know, though, sweaters can turn on you. The sweater you put on this morning, all soft and comfy, can become a hair shirt by noon. I’ve had it happen a million times.

Speaking of which, in high school I had a pair of knee socks which looked to be brown when in the drawer but turned a sickening green in the light of day or rather the light of my high school hallway. So I’d suffer the shock of the chameleon knee socks and agonize all day about how awful I must look but then a week later I’d reach in the drawer and pull out the brown knee socks again. As if within that weeks’ time, the socks had come to Jesus and decided to be brown as I believed them to be. Seriously. This happened over and over again until I left for college and put the socks in the trash. The tyranny of wishful thinking.

A very sweet, earnest woman long involved in mental health advocacy died last week. She was a runner and took a lot of pride in her running although her last race was decades ago. She would often wear shorts and tall athletic socks to meetings. She loved her cats very much and loved Hoarders, the show. We used to talk about both a lot. She advocated by surviving and showing up and showing kindness to everyone every time. Her name was Robin.

Every morning, I fill the bird feeder while dressed in my pajamas and my heavy wool coat. Then I sit on the back porch with my husband who is similarly dressed, and we drink our morning coffee. We watch the gang of sparrows descend and the lone cardinal bopping around under the trees. We hug our dogs and have a lot of laughs. We watch our dogs go in and out of their doghouses, often settling so that both of their noses are just barely visible at their front doors. Our coldest morning this week was 6 degrees. My husband said, “It’s not that bad out here.” I love that about him. And I love this whole new wacky ritual.

I often wear a hat in the house. We keep the heat on very low, it’s true. Today, one of my husband’s colleagues dropped in and I quickly turned up the heat to a reasonable level (68) but kept my hat on. He took off his jacket and then had the look of immediate regret. He refused tea though so he couldn’t have been that cold but then sat on a chair in the kitchen, by far the coldest room in the house, but also the one where all the straight talking is done. He stayed a good while but with his arms folded.