Susan's Fashion Sense

Although we grew up in New York, my sisters and I were not preoccupied with fashion, to say the least. That is, unless one considers the present day obsession with “vintage” or “retro.” I mean, if we are talking about pre-worn, oldie but goodies and the “restructured” pieces in our wardrobe, then absolutely! In that case my sisters and myself were perhaps even the style queens! Obvious (I feel certain)to onlookers , that our shared styles were brought on by necessity. Too many girls in one house for my frugal father and our overwhelmed mother to indulge any one of us with something as impractical as more then two outfits at a time. I remember discussing my perceived need for new clothes with my father. His reply became a life lesson I never forgot: “Need? What you need are two outfits; one to wear while you wash the other and the other to wear while you wash the first one. Anything more and you are talking about want.”

My father was right and I knew it, even though it didn’t fit into my plan to purchase a new skirt. That was about the time I began honing in on my sewing skills and started making my own clothes, or at times restructuring old ones that fell second-handedly into my lap. It wasn’t until my college years when I worked part time and had a little extra cash in my hand that I actually got to choose a piece simply because I liked it. Still, my father’s practical side always overrides my thoughts of fashion grandeur that swirl in my mind whenever I visit my favorite boutiques.

It was during those same college years that I began dating Susan’s son, Jeff. I had never before been around any woman who always seemed to be dressed up: clothes, heels, nails and makeup to boot! Even the gowns Susan wore casually around her house were consistently of some luxurious fabric in bright colors that flowed as she walked across her plush red carpet. She had polyester bellbottomed pants in every color of the rainbow; all specially made to fit Susan’s petite oriental physique.

The way I saw it was that if Fashion Diva's did shoes, then Susan surely was one! Even her gold house-slippers screamed, "Look at me!" I had little understanding of what I viewed as a secret society. And if this "Secret Society of Fashion Diva's" were real, then the only women I personally knew who were likely members (besides the piano player in our New York church),were (respectively)Miss Piggy and now, Susan. I stood in wonder of the glitz and glam of accessories unlike no others. This whole secret Diva Code eluded me altogether. While I did enjoy it in Susan, I felt no need to join the ranks myself.

It wasn’t so much that she was stylish as it was that she knew what worked for her and she spared no expense when it came to filling her closet. So, two years ago when the family saw no other option but to do a dementia forced intervention with Susan, it was evident that she had kept every item of clothing that she had styled throughout the years. It was actually an education (for practical me), to see how the quality and fabrics had held up for Susan. They were mostly all still in use, since their purchases had been more about what worked for her rather than what everyone else was wearing.

We infiltrated what clothing we could into her new smaller closet in her bedroom at our house. Sadly, as much as we (and Susan) fought change, it became clearly undeniable that much of it just wasn’t working anymore. Her bellbottomed pants (which had been hand-altered by Susan to her new smaller size) fastened in the back. That was a problem now with her impaired brain-to-hand communication. Besides, the entire rainbow of pants needed Susan’s standard two and a half inch heels to prevent them from dragging the ground; but Susan now required lower safer shoes to help keep her steady. Suddenly, her seventies-style groovy bellbottoms were slipping down her hips and dragging the ground, making her look like a little girl playing dress-up rather then the sophisticated lady that she once was. Now, the once stylish cape sleeves dragged through her food, the flexible waist skirts slid to her ankles and anything resembling zippers or hooks became unattainable stumbling blocks to her independence.

Yes, a wardrobe intervention became necessary. At one point Jeff took his mother out for a few hours while Katrina and I went through her closet removing the bellbottomed pants and replacing them with elastic waist pants. We knew that she would never rid herself of them willingly. But leaving them there for her to deal with each day meant that she would naturally put them on. In a wierd way, it was somehow sad to see them go, but the hard truth is that they just could no longer work for her. And the skirts that were several sizes too big had given us our last wardrobe error giggles. We swapped items out with things she had approved of on previous shopping trips. We still focused on her favorite reds, greens, oranges and yellows, but with simpler functions for the new girl.

But don’t worry; Susan embraces a new style now. Again, one all her own and all about her needs and desires. Although I find myself often physically dressing her these days or at least picking matching outfits from her closet and explaining to her or the aid what order they will be worn, she still accentuates them with her new persona. And, when my matching outfits bore her, she opens her own closet and mixes and matches (NOT!) her own taste to robe herself with. All of us have grown used to her new fashion and admittedly even anticipate seeing what she might be fashioning from day to day and more recently, from hour to hour. I call them Alzheimer’s clothes and lets just say, she likes them this way.



(Note: All clothing pictured on this entry show outfits put together by Susan- for Susan. One shows off her women's long johns that she often wears as pants. Another pic captures her atttempt to leave the house in her bathrobe-worn as a coat. And see how shirts are worn as scarves, rollers as hair ornaments and sunglasses indoors. Around here, it's all good!)