Overheard

outside a Target fitting room last week...

I was looking through a clearance rack that was situated right next to the fitting rooms near the kids departments. A mother is standing outside the door of a fitting room, just a few feet from where I am standing, having a conversation with her young son inside. He opens the door slightly, she kneels down and examines, while he complains that the pants feel "funny". She seems to think they are fine; he seems to be finding everything he possibly can wrong with them. He begins to get agitated, so she, clearly at the end of her patience, says "fine, we'll take them home and you can grow into them, then they won't feel funny anymore". He closes door to change. A minute later he calls through the door, in a very loud, very clear, slow voice..."Moooommmm? I figured out why the sweat pants felt so weird. (Pause for dramatic effect)... I forgot to keep my UNDERWEAR on when I tried them on!!!!!!". I had to laugh. The mom looked appalled, embarassed, and amused all at once, head in hand, shaking head. But she also seemed to appreciate that I had seen the humor in it. Especially since the fitting room attendant did not. At all. In fact she glared at the mother, who then loudly reminded the boy that it was okay, they would be buying them.

Okay, enough of that. Excuse my self-indulgence, I was just seeing what it felt like to be the woman observing. I wish that I had been her, but alas, I was not. I was the appalled, embarassed, amused mother. There was a woman observing at a sale rack, and she did laugh. And there was a fitting room attendant, and she did glare. I love Curly dearly, but I find I need to brace myself for public outings. Oh, and if you shop at Target, all I can say is that I am fairly confident he only made this mistake with one pair of pants. He had already tried on 2 pairs, then unbeknownst to me had fully dressed himself again. He asked if he needed to try on the others, and when I insisted, I can only guess that in a fit of frustration he accidentally pulled off everything, and didn't even notice. Velo-dude came to the same conclusion independently, upon being told the story.

Curly seems to be all about the underwear, or the lack thereof. This past summer, I noticed at one point that he was going through underwear like there was no tomorrow. He's got a lot of pairs, and kept running out before I had the laundry done for the next week (we don't wear much white in this family). I finally had to go out and buy more. Then one night as he was getting undressed I happened upon him, and found him removing not one, but three pairs of underwear from his little bod. Huh?

"Curly, why were you wearing three pair of underwear today?"

"What? Oh, I have to do that or my shorts fall down. If I wear three, they fit perfectly."

Well, that explains that. He had 3 pairs of shorts that were identical except for color, that's 9 pairs of underwear a week, plus whatever he wore on the better-fitting shorts days. That's a lot. I have to applaud him for finding a solution to his problem, without going to me for help. Any 6-year old's mind is a fascinating thing, but this one is definitely wired uniquely.

Sorry for the "my kid's so cute/embarassing/etc." story. But hey, he's a big part of my life! I'll try to give warning next time.