If Clothes Make the Man, Put on a Party Dress

Shoot me if I ever go shopping for clothes to stay home in. The clothes I'm home in are the same clothes I'm out in. They're the ones I remove when it's time to put on my pajamas. And if there's a day I don't leave home (for instance, if I'm throwing up) I just stay in my pajamas.

I don't get why you need specific clothes to be at home. If I'm painting, I wear painty clothes that remind me of all the other times I've been painting. If I'm using cement to attach broken dishes to my mosaic stairs, I have a baggy pair of holey jeans that I can't wear out anymore. When I'm cooking (which is about as rare as throwing up) I wear an apron. And if I'm doing any of my other favorite things that don't include lying on the sofa or watching TV, I feel just fine in my normal clothes.

That's why I laughed the other day when, with thirty minutes between a play and dinner, my friend said we had just enough time to go shopping for some new clothes to stay home in. I've bought my share of running clothes, school clothes, work clothes and dressy clothes, but I've never spent a dime on 'home clothes'.

If I'm at home and for some reason I think it's necessary to save my 'good clothes', I change into something bad. These undesirables include a favorite wool sweater with a tiny moth hole, an old plaid shirt that's so long if tucked in it makes my butt look big and a giant pair of boyfriend jeans that in addition to rolling up the cuffs three times I have to roll down the waistband. These are my home clothes. I didn't have to go shopping for them.

I've asked an Italian friend if they use the phrase, 'shoot me if...' and he told me they say 'kill me if....' but he assured me I'd be understood in any case. So, if you ever catch me out buying clothes to stay home in, shoot me or kill me before I make the purchase. I want to be sure I'm never caught dead in stay-at-home-clothes I've actually gone shopping for.