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Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Runway to Heaven

There is some religious group in my community where the women wear long skirts, have really long hair and don't wear make-up. They don't wear any head coverings. Clothes don't look hand-made. They drive, have electricity and don't seem to have a huge plethora of kids. I have no idea what the religion is, and I really don't care actually, but it's the dress of the women that struck me.

There were a bunch of these women were at Wally World the other day (yeah, I seem to spend a lot of time at Wal-Mart. Just don't ask...) So anyway, I noticed that they all had on long denim skirts. All the way to the ground denim. They also had on tennis shoes. This, overall, was not a fashion statement of the good. It was not attractive at all. While the women were not necessarily ugly, these unbecoming fashion make them all look very, very short. And sort of stumpy. They were thin, but frumpy-looking. Is that the point?

Back in the Wild West I wore a long denim skirt, a pair of pink cowboy boots, a western shirt and a cool belt and I was looking stylish. I was "in"- I was cool. The more I looked at these women, the more I realized several things about myself.

First, I wanted to rush home and hem all my denim skirts short because I didn't want to be confused as a member of this religion, since I have a non-god issue. Then I thought about it. I could never be confused as a member of this religion because of several things. My hair is way too short- right now I'm sporting a very short pixie cut, short for even pixie standards, so my hair isn't long enough to either hang to my ass or put up in a HUGE bun. And speaking of ass, my ass is waaaaaaay to big to be a member of this church. I swear, ever single one of these women are tiny. Small. Thin. Skinny. There is no way I could belong since I have a fat ass, junk in the trunk, loot in the boot, whatever you want to say, I am just not skinny enough to be there.

And I have fashion sense, which is obviously missing here. I am not a fashion snob- I don't make enough money to be such, and I'm also not a perfect size 5 so not all fashions are meant for me so a fashion snob I am not. But I like to look nice and I try be neat and stylish. Not frumpy. I like clothes. And when I see these women they are always in really really long skirts, denim during the week (their answer to wearing jeans if they were allowed to sport pants?) or floral on Saturdays and Sundays- or dresses with really big flowers on them.

Do you think people with short hair are banned? Are fat people banned? Would I have to grow my hair and lose 25 pounds to join? What if I could make a big financial donation? I do own the long ugly denim skirt and have some tennis socks, after all. Do you think the women are given a brochure of clothes and hair dos and don'ts? Do you think they have a religious version of "What not to Wear"? OMG- I just can't see Clinton and Stacey hosting anything like this... And if this was catching on as a big fashion statement, then how come I'm not seeing a Versace or Armani "God Wear" or "Church" line of clothing?

I dunno. While I'm not religious, I really wonder if God cares what we wear. Is someone wearing a frumpy deim skirt, tennis socks with an ankle ball, no make up, hair to their butts and a Winnie the Pooh t-shirt going to get to heaven before a person in jeans and a Harvard t-shirt sporting eye shadow and loafers? It just seems to be a funny part of a religion to me.

Hey, I'm just sayin'!

Off to hem my skirts,
Maggie

2 comments:

Anna said...

though there are religions that have a sort of "dress code" there are many single churches within different religious groups that teach modesty in dress and appearance. so its not so much that it's a specific religion. You could always ask.

There are some great sites that sell modest clothing specifically.

Maggie said...

Ty-Anna: thanks for the info!