What not to wear anymore - Being 60 (week 31 - by Margaret Ullrich)

Christmas is now in full swing.

Don't believe me?

Look at the TV listings.

Last week AMC decided to show Scrooged twice a night for four nights.

  

Once was enough for me.

Don't get me wrong.  I enjoyed the movie, an update of Dickens' A Christmas Carol.  Bill Murray was his usual funny self and Karen Allen was charming.

No, I don't have a guilty conscience about the message of the story.

The things that got to me were the shoulder pads.  Alfre Woodard was dressed like a football player who had wandered into an office and thrown a jacket over a pair of humongous shoulders.

No, she's not deformed.

She was dressed in the height of fashion, 1988 fashion.

At the time big shoulders looked perfectly normal. 

That was 22 years ago.

An outfit bought in 1988 had big shoulders.

I know.

I have quite a few in my closet.

I used to care about fashion.  I have a BA in Fashion Merchandising.  I wrote knitting instructions for a company that had its office on 5th Avenue, a couple of blocks from the Empire State Building.

Yes, THE Empire State Building.

What the hell happened?

As if Scrooged wasn't enough, on Friday night I watched TLC's What Not to Wear.  

Usually Clinton and Stacy tackle women half my age, who, with a little help, end up looking gorgeous.

This week they had someone closer to my age.  She cried.  She blabbed.  The little secrets came out.  The fear of being "mutton dressed up as lamb".  The feeling that everything in the store is for younger women.  

So, we either run out and make do with what we have in the closet - hey, it still fits - or grab something boring and run like hell before the younger women laugh at us.

We get a lot of exercise running in old clothes.

Clinton and Stacy did their magic.  

Mutton can look good, too.

Who knew?

Paul always asks what to get me for Christmas.

I usually can't think of a thing.

This year will be different.