Underpants

As I was doing the laundry today, I started to ponder underpants. Not panties. I don't know anyone who calls them panties. I hate that word. Anyway, in nice, sunny weather such as we are having today, I hang my laundry outside. Except for my underwear. I am hesitant to display my giant underpants to the neighborhood, especially since I live on a corner lot, thus displaying to a wide variety of passersby whatever is flapping on my clothes line. I have discovered recently that many of the new "developments" forbid the drying of laundry outside lest the real estate values are debased by the sight of empty clothing hanging out there with no bodies inside them. It seems as if laundry is akin to some sort of very personal activity, like putting your toilet out in the yard.

But I digress. The subject is underwear, particularly underpants. My Brit friend Helen calls them knickers, but that word only reminds me of those things my older brother wore back in the days when boys didn't start wearing long pants until they were around twelve years old. They wore knickers, which came to the knee and were usually made of corduroy, which meant you could hear a boy coming five minutes before he showed up. (Which meant you and the dog could beat it out of your brother's way before he had time to torture you. )

But I digress again. I hang my smalls inside on a wooden rack which I set by the window in order to catch the sun. They may be visible from outside, but they are not blatant. My favorite underpants are about 6 or 7 years old. They are no longer pink, blue or beige. They are sort of nothing color. They have a lacy waistband. They are 100% cotton. I love them. They are by Warner. I went in to Macy's shortly before I broke my hip to buy some more, ones with actual colors. They don't make them any more. The only 100% cotton ones were bikini style. I no longer have a washboard stomach. I do not wear bikini style anything. Or they had leg holes tahat came up to your arm pits. I ended up having to buy some nylon things that are nice looking and feel good, but I wanted new cotton underpants just like the ones I have had for all these years.

Today I got the latest Vermont Country Store catalogue. They have lots of cotton underpants, even Lollipops, but they look like old lady underpants. My Warner cotton underpants do not look like old lady underpants and that's what I want again.

I shall wear my new nylon underpants, of course, but I shall continue to wear my old Warner 100% cotton underpants with the lacy waist band until they fall off my body in a gray heap.