House of Lingerie…Or not. Whatever.
For fourteen years, I have worn one of Jeremy’s roomy t-shirts and granny panties to bed. I don’t even wear shorts because I can’t stand the feeling of anything on my legs. This means that when my kids knock on the door in the middle of the night I pull the shirt down as far as it goes to cover myself, but let’s call a spade a spade, they see me in my underwear. It’s not very proper and it has never made me feel especially dignified.I went through a stage where I attempted to do better. I bought two t-shirt like gowns, but the v-neck came down too far, so I was always fidgeting with it, and I wasn’t comfortable.Sometimes I’d google “comfortable pretty nightgowns,” but I worried about buying the right one. What store sold the most comfortable nightgowns? Does anyone know the answer to these questions? Eventually, I decided the whole thing was just too hard because who wants to devote time to finding the perfect sleeping clothes anyway? My children seeing me in my underwear is fine. They walk in on me in the bathroom all of the live long day, so it’s not like they can feign shock.Then one night I was watching an episode of House of Cards. There is a scene where Claire’s character is getting ready for bed and walks out of her closet wearing a pretty nightie - short, silky and white. It occurred to me that this is how I imagine thoughtful, put-together women dress for bed. It occurred to me that this is how I wished I dressed for bed: all sexy like.Once, when I was a teen and visiting my Aunt Colleen, I sat in her room while she went through a bag of old clothes. Every now and then she’d pull out a blouse or black dress and highlight it’s great attributes. “This is a great black dress. Works for so many occasions. I wore this dress while I was working on the Academy Awards for many years. You want it?” she’d ask.After a while of this, my Aunt Kellie made herself into the bedroom. “Ugh, Colleen!” she said, spying a pair of Looney Tunes boxer shorts near the bed. “You have to wear nicer clothes to bed. You think Mick appreciates that you wear cartoon boxer shorts?”Aunt Colleen rolled her eyes “Kellie, I don’t care.” My Aunt Colleen is a classy woman, but also very practical, so she was going to wear whatever served the purpose without thinking too much about it.“Well you should. I would have never gone to bed with Steve wearing that. Men appreciate the effort you put in, especially when you’ve been married a while. “ Aunt Kellie argued.Aunt Colleen didn’t respond. She just made a face that suggested Aunt Kellie was being ridiculous and continued on, pulling out a USC sweatshirt from 1989 and holding it up for me to inspect. “How about this?” She asked.This memory came to me as I watched House of Cards that night and I resolved to be the sort of woman who wore clothes she felt good in to bed.The next morning, I invested in a nightgown that came to mid thigh, had a soft, thick lace bodice and straps and a covered area, instead of lace, where the breast was. I also found a feminine short blush robe on sale and bought that too.Jeremy is going to be happy, I thought.I had just gotten out of the shower the night I wore my nightgown and robe for the first time."What are you wearing, Mom?” Isabella asked"It's my new robe” I said"You look like you’re wearing something a rich old lady would wear,” she replied.“What?”Then Jeremy piped in."It does look like something that like, she would wear in, what's that movie?""Like in Overboard! The lady in Overboard would wear that,” said Isabella"Yeah, you look like the llama from Sing,” Jeremy went on.I just stared.“Yeah. You know the old lady llama who owns the opera house?” He clarified.Yeah Jeremy. Got it. Thanks.And Isabella and Jeremy snickered and snickered.So, let me just re-cap for you. My husband was making fun of me for looking polished and sexy.The world is so weird.“You should be happy,” I finally said to him.“No. It’s fine. Wear what you want, sweetie,” He said.OH I WILL. I’LL WEAR WHAT I DAMN WELL PLEASE. DON’T YOU WORRY.And I wore my sexy little number every night…for like two months.It was nice while it lasted.I’m now back to Jeremy’s old shirts for two reasons: One, it was starting to get chilly and the lace just couldn’t keep my shoulders warm enough. But worse than that, and second - since the cut was a deep v-neck, when I would sleep on my side, my boob would kind of fall out. And listen, I mention this only because my boobs are small. They don’t usually ever get to “fall out” of anything, so let me have this.But I still keep my Overboard/llama robe on my dresser at night so when my kids knock on the door at 2am, I can cover my ass.