In the town where I grew up there were two stores that sold clothing. Both were independent stores, owned and run by members of our community. I don’t remember our folks as having a preference of one store over the other. We tended to favor one store if we were shopping for jeans because they had a large selection of different sizes. Our family had four boys and we wore jeans most of the time. We would get a new pair of jeans for rodeo weekend and another new pair for back to school. Sometimes there would be a new shirt to go with the jeans, but about half of our shirts were made by our mother. Less exciting clothing like underwear and socks tended to end up in Christmas presents, and I don’t remember shopping for those items during the years I lived at home.

Buying clothing is very different these days. I know of several stores that sell clothing and I have purchased clothing at local businesses, but more and more I am learning to shop online for clothes. That process started for me with jeans, which used to be such an important part of my wardrobe. For much of my life I have been able to purchase jeans by waist and inseam measurements. A few years ago, I noticed that stores stopped stocking jeans in my size. I learned to purchase jeans with legs that were too long and Susan would hem them to fit. Then, for whatever reason, one of the major brands of jeans stopped making jeans in my size at all - at least I thought they did until I learned that my size was not in the men’s section, but in the boy’s section. I learned to shop for boys size 16 husky. Then that size was no longer available at local stores.

Meanwhile several online retailers offered jeans that fit, at least most of the time. The problem with purchasing jeans, whether in a store or online is that sizes are no longer consistent. After years of not having to try on pants in the store because I knew my waist and inseam sizes, I discovered that those numbers were no longer consistent. The measurement of an inseam or waist could vary by as much as 3 or 4 inches. What the label said was not the same as a tape measure reported. That is a minor inconvenience in a store that has a dressing room where you can try on clothing before purchasing, but it is a bigger inconvenience when purchasing online as you have to package up and return clothing that comes in the wrong size. Add to that my tendency to prefer to purchase sales items, which can have restrictions on returning, and I’ve made a few clothing purchase mistakes.

A dozen years ago, purchasing clothing became a kind of family joke for us. Susan was shopping for a new dress for our daughter’s wedding. One evening we were with our son and we started to do internet searches for mother of the bride dresses. Our son and I tried to think of obscure search terms that yielded some very unusual clothes. We would giggle as we came up with new ways of searching, claiming, “I bet no one has ever Googled “neo-goth mother of the bride dress,” or “discreet middle aged ball gown.” Susan found our joking and the funny pictures that we turned up to be no help at all in finding the dress for which she was searching. She finally found a lovely dress, purchased at a small boutique that we discovered when traveling.

Recently she has been shopping for a dress once again. This time the occasion is our upcoming 50th wedding anniversary. We plan to have a friend who is a professional photographer take family pictures and we want to have nice clothes for the pictures. Our son and I have been trying to come up with unique search terms to “assist” with her shopping. As far as I know she never did try “post apocalyptic cat herder gown,” thought I thought it as a unique suggestion. She has, however, tried her best to find something that fits her style in reasonable colors.

I might add that if I am a bit reluctant to spend much money on clothes, Susan is even more frugal. She has never been one to get carried away with spending and she gets no pleasure out of spending more money than is necessary. Whatever she does, she won’t be extravagant when it comes to cost. I suppose another factor is that neither of us get much joy out of shopping. We both tend to avoid the chore and we aren’t likely to spend much time trying to find new shops or browsing in places just to see what they’ve got.

Part of the problem is that there are too many choices. As a kid we had jeans or dress slacks. There were, to my knowledge, only two choices for kids pants. And dress slacks came in black, navy blue, brown, or grey. Other colors weren’t considered to be necessary. It was fairly easy to find a new pair of slacks. Today there are so many different kinds of men’s slacks that I couldn’t begin to name all of them. Being of a certain age, I’m drawn to cargo pants, though I never put things in all of the pockets. It seems to be convenient to have a few extra pockets. You never know what you might want to carry. I still like to have a good pair of jeans, though a good pair of jeans is hard to find. Just because they are jeans doesn’t mean that they are well made or will last. I’ve had a few pairs of pants that looked like jeans and were sold as jeans that were not well made and did not last with the kind of work that I do. And I am a minister. It isn’t like I’m a construction worker or farmer. Then again I do like to work in the shop and do chores at the farm. I’m competent with a chainsaw and I’ve dug my share of post holes.

I don’t think I’m going to get better at shopping for clothes as I grow older. At least I don’t plan to give more time or effort to the chore than is necessary. Still I may just do a quick internet search for “floor length zombi anniversary pantsuit” just to see what images pop up.