I've been going through my closet in anticipation of a clothing swap/bachelorette party this weekend, but I'm having trouble finding much that I'd want to pass on on someone else. I'm not really crazy about the clothes I do wear, so you can imagine how much I dislike the clothes I don't. There's a lot of garbage in my closet.
There are some real puzzles in there, too. Like, why do I have a Dokken T-shirt in my closet? I don't like Dokken. I never liked Dokken. Gun to my head, knife to my throat, I couldn't name a single song by Dokken. I must have borrowed it from Roone, but why would I do that? I'm so at a loss that I can't even think of a ridiculous fake reason for hyperbolic effect.
Other, lesser questions: why do I still have Gap shirts from my sophomore year of high school? Do I honestly believe that two-sizes-too-big western shirts are flattering? Did the cat piss all over these Doc Martens, or was that the pair I threw out the last time I excavated this far back?
These are the mysteries of my closet, and they will never be solved because I'm going to take a small pile of the best stuff, neatly folded, to the swap meet. Then I'm going to give Roone his shirt back and shove all the rest of that shit in a trashbag to take it to the Salvation Army, where people will be free to either buy and enjoy it or mock it ruthlessly.
On a related note, Eric deep-cleaned his room this week, and in the process found a T-shirt I haven't seen in probably three years.
My first thought was, Wow! My Charles Whitman shirt!
My second thought was, Wow! I'll never wear that again! Except maybe for sleeping or doing really filthy work like trimming hedges or cleaning out my closet.
Sadly, I realized this week that the time when I thought it was hilarious to wear T-shirts with just-too-easy mass murderer gags on them has passed, especially if those shirts have Coke stains on them and nearly come down to my knees.
Still, I'm keeping it. I bought it at Sound Exchange (where I later met a surly yet tender young record store clerk named Eric) as a present to myself the day I dropped out of UT. I remember feeling very alone, scared, and defiant, and thinking myself very clever, when I walked out of the store with it. Yeah, this'll show 'em! Fuck the system! Snipe the system from the tower! Heh. Oh, shit, that was my last $20. I wonder if Randall's is hiring? Yep, pretty clever. But it's got sentimental value, and I still think it's pretty funny, so the Whitman shirt stays. Everything else has got to go.
Oh, if you're into that sort of thing, the Austin History Museum is supposed to have a great Charles Whitman collection. I've only seen it online via the Statesman. You'll have to register to read it if you don't want to drive downtown and check it out.