Kat, me and Tam many moons ago…

I have a confession.  About five years ago I was the target of an intervention (yes, it is true).  My friends Kat and Tam cared enough to tell me the truth and I have to tell you it changed my life.  I was out-of-touch and my problem areas were beginning to seem bigger than ever.  I don’t know what would have happened if they hadn’t stepped in when they did – but I know it would not have been pretty.

They told me with love, but unflinching conviction that I must immediately stop wearing my mom jeans…I was to throw then out – every last pair – that very day. I realize some of you may be unaware of the magnitude of this issue.  Some of you may not be able to even identify what mom jeans are, but never fear – I will create a visual of this for you.  Mom jeans are high-rise, straightleg jeans with a tapered ankle.  The way they are designed they have the effect of visually doubling (vertically) the size of your behind and drawing the viewer’s eyes right to your hips and behind (the tapered ankle is to thank for that).  This is not an attractive look on anyone  (I repeat – ANYONE), but it is particularly problematic for someone who has enough fanny for themselves and a friend (ah, yes this baby’s got back).

So thankfully my friends cared enough to tell me the truth.  Following my intervention I heard of many other interventions around the country.  Even Oprah took up the cause against mom jeans (thankfully that was after I had already redeemed myself – I wouldn’t want Oprah to know how pitiful I was).  Millions of women purged their mom jeans swearing never to fall in that black hole of fashion again.  Stacey London, the “What Not to Wear” girl, blanketed the television airwaves telling women what type of jeans they could wear to replace their mom jeans.  All women in America were instructed to burn their mom jeans.

At the time of this movement the jeans that were en vogue for those in the “fashion know” were low-rise jeans.  Low-rise is a relative term.  Typically it means at the least that the jeans hit below your belly button by an inch or two depending on the maker.  Then there are super low-rise jeans (I think they hit somewhere around four inches below your belly button), those are for folks with no fanny, cute underwear (because they are going to stick out when one sits) and no issues with flashing others a view of their fanny when they bend over (well, clearly this is not how they are advertised – this is the description according to Carol).  I can’t put a check by any of those things on the list I just provided so the super low-rise are out where I am concerned.

I do want to try and remain hip as I age, particularly now that I am the new forty, but there are limits that transcend age and mandate sensibility.  I didn’t get this far in life covering up certain parts to change course in midlife (and let me note that the parts don’t quite look the same as they did when I was twenty which lends greater support to the logic of full coverage).  I am sensitive to the reality that my attempts at hip-ness should not present a  risk of scarring others’ psyche.

After throwing out every last pair of mom jeans I searched and searched and I found the jeans for me – low-rise (on the higher end of the low) and flared (these help balance out the hips – yes Stacey, I listened and I learned).  Once equipped with my hip new jeans selection I quickly learned that my new past-time in life would be trying to pull those jeans up high enough so that my underwear didn’t show every single time I sat down.

After I realized the jeans were only going to go so high I went to Plan B and started pushing my underwear down so they wouldn’t show.  Well, as a girl with “real” underwear (you know the kind that actually cover all the relevant areas) I had a lot of fabric bulk to push back down into my jeans and it never stayed there.  I cannot tell you how many times Cheyenne has told me when I am bending over at the store – “Mom! I can see your underwear!”  This of course has never been said in her quiet demure voice she uses for school…oh no.  For these announcements she uses her broadway stage voice as if she were Little Orphan Annie belting out “The Sun Will Come Out Tomorrow”…I kid you not.  She might as well go on the supermarket loudspeaker and say, “granny panties on aisle 4!”

After pulling up and pushing down,  I concluded that I needed to just wear tops that would cover everything in the back.  Most days that keeps me compliant with the public decency laws.   I do still find myself constantly pulling at my shirt though to make sure my granny panties aren’t displaying themselves in all their glory to the world. Alas, the low-rise and super low-rise are still “in” and my jean options remain limited (and I’ll never go back to the mom jeans- I have paid my dues to society and the offense has been purged from my record).

I really do wish the super low-rise phase would fade away (the low-rise are bad enough).  They really are not for 99% of folks (remember the checklist – those with a behind need not apply) and yet too many wear them.  I have seen many a fanny I shouldn’t have on the campus thanks to super low-rise jeans.  Although I would really like to say something to these poor girls to alert them to their exposure, I don’t.  I rationalize that surely they must know – they must feel a draft.

I am thinking that I should perhaps have pins made up that say,  “SAY NO TO CRACK!”   and give one to every offender I see.  Too subtle?  Perhaps I should just start giving out granny panties to the offenders.  Who knows…maybe I’ll start a new fashion trend.  What a legacy that would be…the new forty chick who sexied up granny panties.  My children would be so proud.

Day nine of the new forty – obla di obla da

CC