Friday, June 02, 2006

ADAM AND THE BANANA OUTFIT

I went shopping recently – for clothes. Clothes shopping can be as traumatic for men as it is therapeutic for women. First of all, we don’t like it. Second of all, we don’t know what the hell we’re doing. And third, we don’t like it. I don’t know why exactly, but I suspect it has something to do with the fact that we don’t know what the hell we’re doing.

I have a hard enough time understanding the menu at Starbucks – dressing myself presents an even more confusing set of options. Not only do things need to fit, but they need to “go.” Matching. So many colors. So many styles. So many sizes. So many stores! It’s so much easier to have someone tell me what to wear than to trust the random combination of garments I select won’t make me look like Mrs. Roper on Three’s Company. That only happened once, by the way, and the paisley table cloth I was wearing didn't last the night.

Anyhow, I knew I needed some new clothes and wanted to prove to Geri that I could do it on my own. So I headed over to Banana Republic, a fashionable clothing retailer with a reasonable return policy and a staff of overeager beavers. Don’t read too much into that expression unless you really want to.

Shopping alone, I knew there were only two ways the mission would be a success. I could buy whatever the mannequins were wearing, as they’re always decked out in the latest and greatest stuff. But that would be costly, I knew, as those trendy mannequins tend to have expensive taste. My other option was to find the gayest employee in the store, whose name happened to be Adam, and have him walk me through some options. Two hours later I left with several matching “outfits” and still had money left in the bank for a Starbucks on the ride over to Geri's place for final approval.

Upon showing my spread of new threads to Geri, she said, “They all look nice – I like them. Did your sister go with you?”

They looked too good. She was onto me.

I wanted to tell her how I’d picked them all out myself. How I’d spent hours and hours mixing and matching tops and bottoms until I’d found the perfect fit. How I’d examined patterns and colors and fabrics and textures. And how insulted I was that she would assume I’d had any help at all.

Instead, I told her the truth.

“No…my sister did NOT help. But close. A girl named Adam did.”

“Good!” she exclaimed. “I like it all…everything looks very nice.”

“Yeah, I knew I could do it.” I said.



This story really has no point. But if you're looking for one, then here it is: There’s really no shame in asking for help.

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