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Okay, I don’t really want to spend eternity watching women search for the perfect pair of pants, but there is something magical about the dressing room at the Talbots in my hometown. The individual dressing rooms open into a common space containing a couple of comfy chairs and a thee-way mirror at one end, as dressing rooms often do. What is notable is the air of courtesy and quiet enthusiasm. I’ve exchanged smiles with the daughters of little old ladies with perfectly set hair in search of the perfect pair of “trousers“ and enjoyed hearing groups of middle aged women trading clothes between dressing rooms with a “This didn’t work for me, but it would look darlin’ on you, hon!” (Hell, my sisters and I have done that minus the hon and darlin’!) Shopping on your own? Never fear– there’s always someone nearby who is happy to offer her candid but kind opinion about how your butt looks in those jeans or whether the dress you’re on the fence about is flattering. You can bump into your best friend’s mother, as I have done on one occasion. Or run into someone from church, as my mother does religiously. Everyone is very upbeat, very southern, and very sweet. It really is one of the happiest places I know.
With my mother and I slowing down (lucky me to be slowing down at the speed of an 80-year-old), our long jaunts to the mall have become short visits to the nearby Talbots. We rarely miss it when I’m home, and I usually return with a handful of sale items. After a few lazy days on the couch, we mustered up the energy to go to Talbots this afternoon. I optimistically made my way through the store, filling up my dear mother‘s arms with blouses and a dress and more blouses. A flawlessly dressed woman named Jean* took my clothes to a dressing room and scribbled Rebecca on the door. I continued shopping and then went back to try things on. Trying things on is its own challenge now. A funny quirk of MS (mine, at least) is that raising my arms over my head** is exhausting. This has seriously reduced my stamina for trying on clothing, but I haven’t been shopping in so long that I was determined to make the most of this trip. I tried on a pair of white Capri pants with a pink blouse. Jean and I decided pants were a size too big, so she fetched a smaller size. I returned to my dressing room with the smaller pants and should have stopped. Instead I struggled back into my own jeans (a feat made more difficult by at home eating habits) and managed to get one last blouse on before giving up. I opened the dressing room door and stood briefly to get the approval of my mother and Jean, who were outside chatting about my MS in hushed tones. Mom’s words of explanation regarding her hot mess of a daughter are usually met with sympathy, but there was a surprise bonus this time… perfectly-accessorized, fully-ambulatory Jean, who had been helping us all along, also had MS! Talbots magic strikes again.
*Name changed in case Jean isn’t as interested in having her business all over there internet as I am.
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