Tracey has been at me for months to go through my clothes and toss out anything too old or paintstained to wear, or anything I’ve outgrown. I’ve been putting it off primarily because I was pretty sure I needed it all. Turns out I was a little wrong.
Rather than ask me again to do it, Tracey pulled out my entire wardrobe last weekend and dumped it onto our bed. Then she made piles she labeled I Like, I Hate and I Don’t Care (or ‘you can keep’, ‘you can’t keep so don’t even ask’ and ‘you can keep if you don’t wear them while you’re out with me but really I think you look ridiculous in these’).
I figured we’d be bagging up half a dozen items – my wardrobe isn’t extensive. In fact, I tend to wear the same seven T ‘s in a sort of daggy shirt roster. If I buy a shirt it’s because I really like it and once I like something I tend to keep liking it: I still have a KC & The Sunshine Band album. One of my shirts was purchased on our honeymoon eleven years ago and it was only that it had a paint stain on it that it ended up in a bag (after much soul searching and biting of lip).
I was floored when I managed to fill five bags with discarded clothes. I didn’t even think I had five bags of clothes.
Trimming a wardrobe can be tough for a guy. Fellow men-folk, my tip on sorting through your wardrobe is to throw out anything torn, faded, stained, too big, too small, too smelly or that your wife tells you to, even if:
- it’s your favourite shirt
- you think you might wear it to a costume party when they start having 2000-2010 themed parties
- you think you might use it to paint the house in
- you think your weight fluctuates & after you peak at 110kg it’s bound to swing back to it’s usual 79kg
- you think it looks good on you because it fits so tightly it makes your muscles pop
- you think the manly smell emitting from under the armpits is a natural pheromone
- you think the rip in the crotch can probably be stitched up
- you really, really want to
