It works out to being about twice a
year that my friends and I gather for a Saturday Morning Clothing
Exchange. The email list that goes out advertising the exchange is I
think the same one as a pretty interesting sounding book club, to
which I've always been invited, but have never even read one of the
books, though my intentions are always very good. One time, even
though I hadn't read the book, I almost actually went to the meeting!
But I chickened out at the last minute in typical me fashion. Ha,
fashion. Because I'm really blogging about a clothing exchange and
just got sidetracked thinking about the book club. Lol.
We take all our castoffs (and our
husbands' castoffs, and some homewares and some kids' stuff...
basically anything we need to get out of our life) to the home of
someone generous enough to host us, and we separate into piles: tops,
pants, dresses, shoes, men's, scarves, etc. Then we rummage through
and try to be polite about it, even though we are all totally wanting
to take home everything that everyone brought for ourselves. I'm not
very discreet about my desire to revamp my entire wardrobe at these
things.... I dive in face first and only come up for air when it's
time to use the dressing room. (which is a bathroom, because we are
at someone's house.)
These things are SO FUN. Often we all
bring a little breakfasty pastryish thing to contribute and we have
coffee and since we are surrounded by piles of clothes there's plenty
to talk about, right off the bat. Naturally, we first talk about
purging possessions, simplifying our lives, (it always goes back to
the KonMari method,) and from there we move into the reasons we've
got all these clothes to get rid of, which is usually due to the
realization that we're never going to lose the babyweight. There's no
awkwardness, because people hauling in loads of castoffs and
breakfast pastries are natural conversation starters, and it's a
diverse group so we really have plenty to talk about.
At the end of the morning, all that's
left (which tends to be a lot) is donated; the one who volunteers to
take it decides what center it goes to, and all that stuff is out of
our lives forever, thankfully. Not that I have EVER gone home with
less than what I brought, as good as my intentions for that outcome
may be. No, no, I come home with OODLES of new things to wear! This
time, I got a new dress!
I pretty much stopped wearing dresses
(almost) nine years ago when I started breastfeeding because they are
just so impractical. But now that those demands are fewer, I feel
like I can pull it off again. And this one has buttons down the
front, just in case.
Some
people just come to visit, with no intention of taking anything home
with them. This time we spent the last portion talking about the
books that will be assigned for the book club in the months to come.
Sometimes we bring kids, sometimes we don't. It's all very loose and
leaves me feeling filled up with good social juice, and at the same
time freshened by letting go of some possessions and acquiring some
new bits for my drawers, which always feels good, especially if they
were free.
If
you're looking for more ways to be social with a purpose, I'd highly
suggest this sort of gathering. I'm already looking forward to our
next one!
No comments:
Post a Comment