Last year, I was getting ready to go on a trip to Florida for Christmas, then we would swing over to Maryland to visit my daughter and toddler grandson. I had lots to do, so I embarked on one of those fit-everything-into-one-productive-day events.
First things first, I stopped at my chiropractor’s office for an appointment and got my neck and back adjusted. I shopped at several places and visited several banks, which meant standing at way too many check stand lines.
My very last chore for the day was Walgreens. As I stood in line to pay for my items, the lady behind me tapped me on the shoulder.
“Excuse me? Your sweater is on inside out?”
“What?” I turned around and faced her.
“Your sweater, it’s inside out.” She reached over and tugged on the white, two inch long, manufacturer’s information tag sewn into the neckline of my black sweater and smiled.
“Oh!” A burst of nervous laughter escaped. I looked at the seams on my shoulders and sleeves, and sure enough. My sweater was inside out! I quickly fixed that, as she graciously held the items I was buying, while I took the sweater off and put it back on correctly.
“Thank You!” I giggled. ” You know, I have gone to many places today, and you’re the first person to say anything.” Then I remembered my chiropractor appointment. I wore my hair short, the white tag on the black sweater was extremely obvious. He worked on my neck as I lay on my stomach on the chiropractor’s table. How is it he didn’t say anything?
This reminded me of when my kids were small, back in the 1980s. I was pretty meticulous about how I dressed when I went out in public back then. Not that I am shoddy now, but you know–youth. One day, I pinned my hair back with barrettes and wore large checkered black and white earrings, that I have long since discarded. They were a one-and-a-half inch square, with a checkerboard design that certainly stood out.
I cradled the phone in my neck as I tried to multitask, while on a last minute phone call before we headed out. The earring post dug into the area behind my ear, so I took the earring off and forgot to put it back on. The kids and I went to several places that day. We even stopped at Burger King for lunch.
We made several trips to the bathroom, but as anyone with multiple kids in tow knows, when Mommy goes to a public bathroom with kids, she seldom gets to look in the mirror. When I got home, I saw the earring I had taken off earlier and realized I went all day wearing only one huge, extremely prominent, black and white earring. This was before wearing only one earring was fashionable.
“Hey guys,” I addressed my elementary school aged kids, “didn’t you notice Mommy was only wearing this one huge earring today?” They all nodded. “Well, why didn’t you tell me I only had one earring on?”
“We thought you liked it that way.” My oldest child chimed in, while the other kids just shrugged their shoulders. Suddenly, all those odd looks I had gotten all day made sense.
I somewhat understand kid thinking, but really don’t understand why grownups don’t say anything in these awkward situations. Possibly because they themselves feel awkward pointing out these things. Fashion nowadays is pretty unique. Sometimes, it is hard to tell if someone intentionally meant to look awkward or not.
For the record, I am one of those people who want to be told, so I am also one of those people who does say something. I say it politely, but if I see a person with a huge white tag sticking out of a black sweater, I would be sure to mention it like the lady at Walgreens.
If you see me wearing my sweater inside out again, please let me know, and I will do the same for you!
Care to share your awkwardly, embarrassing stories similar to this one?
By ~ Elizabeth Yalian ©2013
HIS EYE IS ON THIS SPARROW TOO Still Learning to Lean on God 
Hey,
I nominated you for the liebster award, To see the rules see the page
http://pratibhakulkarni.wordpress.com/2013/05/21/and-the-nominations-are/
Hey, did you realize you wrote this post backwards? Just kidding.
Ok, that was lame, but it was the best I could do since I can’t actually SEE what you’re wearing. Lol
Thank you for the award. I have been pretty absent from my blog this month, but hope to get around to posting and accepting the award very soon. Thank you again!
Good to have you back! After the A-Z challenge, you probably needed a break. 🙂 It is well deserved, you have a great blog!
Aw, thanks! I don’t know about “great” but I’ll take it. I think I’m still trying to figure out what I’m doing, and with no guidelines like the A-Z Challenge for what to write about, my mind went completely blank. Plus I’ve been dealing with a medical issue for over a month now that is very frustrating, and well, just life. Ha! Maybe I’ll get my act together soon. In the meantime, I’m enjoying reading what YOU have to say. 🙂
I am sorry you are dealing with medical stuff. That can be tough and certainly demand an awful lot of thought. As for the writing, I am just a newbie, but I bet you have lots of interesting life experiences to write about if you think back in your life. That is what I do. I find that when I write from the heart or my memories, the words just flow. Hope you are feeling better soon! 🙂
Not Sure if people don’t notice or embarrassed to tell us. Worst ever, was on Disneyland vacation & lady was walking thru crowd with a 3 ft. length of toilet tissue dangling from under her dress. Several people were snickering, I could not stand it, had to tell her.
I bet she hasn’t forgotten that. I am curious, what was her response? Thank you for visiting my blog site.
I enjoy your writings. More people should read them, awesome, I’m nominating you for the versatile blogger award. Here is a link for info about the award: http://sheilamariegrimes.com/versatile-blogger-award/ I hope you accept this. You’re deserving.
Thank you so much Sheila, what a cool looking award! I can almost feel the trophy’s cold, smooth surface. It is an honor to accept it. Thank you again!
One day in the Mommyverse, I dropped two daughters at preschool, dropped son at Mothers Morning Out, did the grocery shopping, stopped by the library, gassed up the car, picked up the dry cleaning, picked up kids, and headed home. There I took off my coat, only to find that my son had covered the back of the coat with Kotex pads. Which nobody in town mentioned to me, although there can’t have been too many people who didn’t get a chance to see them…
Being a parent means you never have to worry about self esteem. Because you just won’t have any left.
Yes, that certainly is much more degrading than a big white tag on an inside-out sweater or even wearing only one very ugly earring! As for us moms, if the entire birthing event isn’t enough to rob us of dignity, our children will be sure to oblige! 🙂
Hey in the 80’s that was stylish! 🙂
I tell people if something’s wrong. Can’t remember anything too memorable about me, but in high school, an all-girl’s Catholic one, one of the nuns was teaching English and everybody was snickering because her blouse was undone and her humongous beige bra was right there in our faces. I told her because I hoped someone would tell me. Of course I engaged in lots of shenanigans to even out that kindness 😉
Oh, she didn’t wear a habit. The nuns there simply dressed conservatively.
Well, as a fellow wordrobe faux pas informant, I applaud you. I imagine this bra thing would have been even more embarrassing to someone as extremely modest minded as a nun. Shenanigans included, I bet that nun had a special spot in her heart for you, as you had the respect to point that out to her, unlike your snickering peers. 🙂
🙂 It probably affected me more somehow. I remember talking about pranks, but rarely following through when it came to her, probably because she was very real when she thanked me. Ah, youth!
Surely she was quite thankful. Yes, sometimes I actually miss the innocense of those days.
I miss them too. We were blissfully unaware of the ugliness that life could hold.
🙂
heheh 🙂
Thanks for stopping by and for the follow. I visited your site. You are a very talented young lady!
Thanks alot Elizabeth for visiting my site, cheers 🙂