You Are Not Your Dress

My father was a modest man. He had no desire for extravagant things and he had no tolerance for my demand for them. Like most kids, I went to school events. Tons of people showed up to them, including boys or girls I liked, those teachers I had crushes on, bullies and kids who teased everybody. Naturally, it was monumental to fit in. Not in the Christian way my parents always talked about. Without remorse, I wanted to be… OF the world, not just IN it.

I had two close friends growing up. Both were named Michelle. These girls were when I got out of the house, my life blood, my family. Their families had far fewer children. Michelle P was an only child and Michelle F was the baby of three. No need to say it, they were both spoiled. The kids at the school called us either the three M’s or M-cubed. Personally, I liked M-cubed best.

For our eighth-grade graduation party, we wanted to wear a very stylish, bell-bottom, plaid, pink with more pink and rust stripes pantsuit. So cool. It was almost the eighties, but we still wanted that vertical striped bell-bottom suit. My parents, mostly my father, refused to buy that suit for me. It was unacceptable. I became irrationally upset over the whole thing. When my father said no, I actually said, “I hate you. You never let me do anything.” I remember those words so clearly because I still bemoan the fact that I never apologized. Those were careless, insensitive words. I never said them again, but decades later, from time to time, I still feel regret over having said them at all.

Why did I tell my father I hated him? Because he bought me a new dress for the party, ignoring everything I said to him about going with the new suit with my friends. Michelle F, lived right across the street and he knew and liked her parents. They got the suit for her. My father thought it was unnecessarily expensive. While I’ll admit, I don’t remember the cost, at the time, I would have thought any price payable. These were my friends, and we deserved to do what we wanted. That was the way I saw it at the time.

Well, I got a new dress. I hated dresses. Still do. Worse, my mother picked it out because she generally picked my dresses.  I’m guessing, It was easier than having to contend with my attitude. There was never a time where I picked out a dress without first having had my mother harangue me about the merits of girls wearing dresses. I would always ask for pants. Even on Sabbath days, it was a fight about why I couldn’t wear pants. Sometimes, I would say, “I’ll wear a suit, just like the boys.” I had no desire to wear a boy’s suit or even to wear boy pants. I didn’t like them either.

Years ago, when I graduated college, I stopped wearing dresses and skirts. When a friend asked, “Why did you stop wearing dresses?” I said, “I grew up.” Now, how is that relevant? I had a two pronged problem. One, I had a dress. It was never easy for me to put on a dress. Two, I didn’t have the suit my friends had. This was an unwinnable issue. I could not go out and get the pant suit, and there wasn’t a person on the planet who I’d ask to do it. Even, if I had asked someone, I wouldn’t have been able to put it on my body. Not only would my father, not have it—he might have given me a good spanking.

So, I protested, and protested for at least two weeks. When that didn’t work, I schemed to get out of the party. Nothing took. My father, would say something like, “I bought that dress and you’re going to wear it.” It was his final word, never to be amended. I knew it the minute he came home with it. When the night of the party came, I stayed in my room refusing to wear the dress.

I hadn’t told my friends that I couldn’t get the suit. I was too embarrassed. Despite my efforts, my father came into my room saying, “I’m giving you twenty minutes to put on that dress.” I got dressed. But when it came time for my father to drive me to the party I was all tears.

“What is wrong with that dress?” my father asked.

“You know I hate dresses.”

“And you know you have to wear it.”

“But my friends are wearing their new pant suits. I should have one too.”

“Well, you don’t.”

I started crying as though he had given me a beating. My father sat down next to me, he said, “Are you your dress?”

“No.” I said through tears.

I knew, when he asked me that the logical and reasonable truth was no, but I sure felt like my dress. He was a man who always solved things with questions and years after his death his questions continue to live in me. His questions have become a part of my identity. During my teen years, they kept me from succumbing to peer pressure. Later in life they kept me from making irrational fiscal decisions. Today, they keep me from buying things I do not need.

When I got my first job after college, I bought a used car, and lived in a modest apartment. My co-workers had new cars and lived in better places. Often times, they would say, you should get a new car. We know you can afford it. They were right. I oftentimes, wanted to buy a new car. But I had the idea, that something could go wrong. It was better to keep my living expenses low. To deal with the peer pressure, I often said to myself, “You are not your car.”

At twenty-six, I began to set my own adult boundaries based on what mattered to me. Many of my friends resisted those new boundaries. They liked me before I said no to doing the things I didn’t want to do. I lost many of my young, professional fun friends that year. But I found myself thinking, “You are not your friends.”

More than anything that question helped when the economy tanked. I started having thoughts like, “You are not your bank account.” Although, I really wanted that pantsuit, I realize it wasn’t that important. My Dad gave me something even better. A talking to. For the rest of my life, his question will echo in my mind, getting louder whenever I need to hear it again. I still hate dresses, but my dad has given me a history of making better decisions by reflecting on my notion of self. For this, I say thank you to him because whenever the societal noise gets too loud, I’m able to look inside and separate myself from all the chatter.