Seen in the wild (Chestnut Street in Center City Philadelphia):

“Scaredy Cat Club” on a bearded, balding man

“Nub Nub” and a picture of an Ewok on a very large young man

I have ordered a t-shirt for myself, because I couldn’t resist, even though I myself don’t wear t-shirts and already have a couple hanging in my closet. But this one spoke to me.

I don’t know what I’ll do with it; I haven’t really been able to wear t-shirts since I was ten and shaped like a sausage; no, I was never a gazelle. Those shirts are unflattering to everyone, anyway, except for thin, fit people under a certain age. With their flimsiness, stretch, and square shape, they might as well have arrows pointing to every swell or bulge on your body.

T-shirts actually make almost every woman look like a nun in civvies. If you can’t wear a habit, look as unappealing as possible, I guess.

They are comfortable, though. My mother wore a lot of t-shirts. Her generation wasn’t particularly fond of them, but my mother adopted them in the 60s, and when she had to move into assisted living and then skilled nursing, her wardrobe was mostly camisoles, t-shirts, and stretch pants. Most of the other ladies her age wore shirts with collars or dresses, and looked like faded little Christmas-ornament apple dolls, but Mom was truculent about her wardrobe. I remember that a friend of hers, who visited her regularly, was sure I was neglecting Mom, because of what was in her closet.

See, I let the skilled nursing do her laundry for her, because I learned when my kid was born that you had to give up something if you wanted to be functional. Taking care of my mother, raising a kid, dealing with a husband who was depressed, working full time as a teacher, writing books, and fencing meant I just didn’t do any more housework than absolutely necessary. I wasn’t about to add another task to my schedule, not if I was trying to be there every week for Mom.

But letting the skilled nursing center do the laundry meant the clothes were thrown in a bag, laundered together, dried in a very hot dryer, and then shoved in her closet without ironing.

Parkinson’s, being partly a disorder of movement and balance, made my mother convinced that reality was about 25 degrees off vertical, so she was very, very bent over, sideways and forwards. Put a wrinkled t-shirt on her, and a pair of baggy shorts vaguely hitched up over her hipbones, and she was a sight.

Sometimes I wish she was still alive. She was a character, a brilliant and driven woman. I would buy her some T-shirts.