Posted on May 29th, 2008 by admin

 

When people criticized Jackie Onassis for spending millions of dollars of Aristotle Onassis’ money on jewelry and clothes the first year they were married, I always felt, if she could get her hands on the money to spend, how wonderful! Her spending wasn’t going to bankrupt him; they gave plenty of money to charity, and he had, after all, got his hands on the most eligible woman in the world. Jackie obviously enjoys clothes (understatement) and I enjoy her enjoying them.

Clothes, it seems to me, are a reasonably innocent if expensive addiction. Some of us get hooked early in life. In Little Rock, Arkansas, where I grew up—during the Depression yet clothes were important your Sunday School dress, Easter dress, school outfits, new dress for a party, costumes for school plays, an evening dress when you were eleven. Somehow my mother, who sewed beautifully, managed these things for my sister and me.

Of course you learn fairly early that what you put on your body isn’t as important to the opposite sex as the shape of the body you put it on (and possibly having naturally curly hair), but still you care. I love my clothes and sometimes go into the closet just to visit them all my Adolfo suits and my one Chanel, Ralph Lauren jackets, Cal Klein silk dresses, evening gowns I wear once a year, and those thirty-two blouses. . . . They are my friends! I have yet to learn the system of having only two terrific outfits you switch back and forth every day for six months, then you put together two new ones. Such spartanism wouldn’t make me happy! We’ll get to you in a minute.

Tags: an evening dress, clothes, costumes for school plays, Easter dress, new dress for a party, school outfits, Sunday School dress