Folded underwear

The kindest & worst gift to receive

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It’s summertime, which means it’s the time of year when my husband’s family gets together, which means it’s the time of year for me to think about my underwear.

Usually they get together every July, but this year it was early, in June — which means underwear prepping and planning had to start early.

I don’t often think about my underwear (which, turns out, is the problem), so it might sound strange to start considering it only before seeing my in-laws.

There’s no thrilling romance novel unraveling here. No grazing knees or midnight trysts; no illicit affairs prompting me to reconsider — and ultimately, to reinvest in — my underwear.

There is a much darker energy in their house and at these gatherings.

Early risers.

My husband’s family is of the early rising nature. Not just early as in early bird gets the worm. But early as in the earliest bird wakes the early birds who get the leftover worms. They want to be the earliest bird, always.

(My boy seems to have inherited this gene, so I’m now an unwilling earliest bird, too. The darkness is strong.)

So, in life before parenthood days, these trips would go a little something like this:

Here I am, on vacation, in and out of sleep at 7am. Why out at all? Why not just in? Why not in the deepest, coziest slumber of all time — given we’re on vacation?

Because my husband pops out of bed right at 6am to “see what everyone is up to.”

You can imagine what hearing these words might do to someone who struggles with a constant need to belong.

These words — and he whispered them!, as if they were meant to lull me back to sleep! — are enough to rattle any hopeful’s slumber.

I now hold this image in my head of everybody buzzing around outside my door at 6am — eating hearty breakfasts, or swimming in the lake, or running all the way around the damn lake, or just having a grand morning time basking in the glow of good health and much happiness. Living full, rich lives and wondering — just briefly, between activities — whether I’ve died.

But it’s 6am, I tell myself, so of course everyone is up to nothing but sleep.

I try to shake my husband’s words from my thoughts and get back into it myself.

But 10 minutes pass and he hasn’t returned. Which means someone is up to something.

So now I’m left wondering: how many someones are up to somethings? There are 8 adults in this house. Could it be just two of them out there? And the other 6 of us are sane and cozy, wishing those two would cut it out?

Or is it possible there are three? Three could be up to something fun.

Even four? Four makes me very uncomfortable.

The very thought of five makes me queasy.

Now I’m wide awake, mind reeling, wondering what party I’m missing, and why there’s a party to miss at this hour.

It’s that feeling of missing out that’s so specific to early morning gatherings of people who all slept in the same house.

Followed by the frustration of knowing there is no reason on God’s green earth that anyone should be missing out on anything at this hour, yet these people have put you in the miserable position of deciding whether to look like the house dud or to surrender to their perverted reality.

This was my battle most mornings, and I started off a total dud. But very slowly — I began with a slump and have made my way to something more dignified — I have given in to their world.

And so it happened that one morning, before anyone should have been awake, I threw off my covers, got out of bed, entered the kitchen with a smile, and discovered my in-laws huddled over stacks and stacks of laundry they’d been folding — presumably since 3am.

My husband and I had left our massive heap of laundry in the washing machine overnight, and his family had not only already transferred it to the dryer, but folded the whole heap of it in an act of kindness.

And sitting right on top of this tower? My 15-year-old, stained, moth-eaten, cartoon bird-adorned Limited Too underwear folded neatly into a little square under the surgical (kitchen) lights.

The cute little birdies sitting on their telephone line chirping excitedly at me — No one has ever tended to us with such care!

And they did the same for the others! Just beneath us! Look!

I don’t embarrass easily, but I’m sure my cheeks lit up.

Probably around when I (i.e. my mom) originally bought that pair of cartoon bird underwear.

I’m a woman of frugal comfort. This can be a gut wrenching combo when it comes to my attire. One or the other could work quite well on its own.

Frugal but still holding onto your dignity? Fast fashion was made for you.

Comfort over all? You live in the age of athleisure and capsule wardrobes. Bask in that win and throw on your cute tennis skirt or denim basics!

But frugal comfort has a special place in this world.

It’s the bargain tennis skirts, denim basics, and underwear of decades past.

It was never meant for harsh lighting and huddled in-laws — not even at its prime.

It’s welcomed home through the rips and tears of my underwear I’ve had since middle school, and kept warm by the bacon-neck Arkansas Razorback sweatshirt my first boyfriend got me in 9th grade.

The things I have held onto for so many years because they still “work.”

Seeing my husband’s family huddled over my underwear did something to me that morning. It roused a tiny sliver of sleepy dignity into action.

I balled out of control soon after, throwing away underwear more than a few years old (almost all), and buying 8 (!!!) new pair after too many hours of Googling where people buy underwear after graduating from Limited Too.

And now? What of this new me?

Now I want nothing more than to leave my laundry in the dryer overnight, and find everyone hunched over it under the brightest lights in the morning — Oohing and Aahing over such a humble display of clean, understated, elegant style.