Greetings Fashionistas!
FASHIONGRANNY is back from vacation, getting a puppy, a stay in the hospital, quitting her job, two flat tires at once and… a lot of perusal of the fashion parameter!
Well! I tell you! Have folks gone crazy without my fashion direction or what?
Let me begin with an old Joan Rivers opening line, ”Can we talk?”, and here is my opening topic. What happened to the Sports Bra? This is a topic I’ve been meaning to get around to for quite a long time, and it became more pressing as I drove from my Island to the doctor in town. I wanted to make sure that my eyes were not deceiving me.
I’m talking about the joggers, runners, whatever we politically correctly call them now, that exercise daily across the Woods Bridge in beautiful downtown Beaufort.
FASHIONGRANNY and gentry in their Golden Years will remember the phenomenon of exercise as more of a health practice than a fashion statement.
There was the group that went to Vic Tanny’s co-ed Gym. Co-ed Gyms were a new thing! My Mother went to Vic Tanny’s, taking me with her. I would meet her at her office building in downtown San Francisco at the 4:30 whistle. The whistle came forth from the Ferry Building at the Embarcadero, and you could hear it all over town. There was a whistle at 8:00 am to start work and a 4:30 pm whistle to indicate the work day’s end.
We would walk up Market Street to the Gym and she would proceed to exercise. “Workout” was a term yet to be coined. There were men and women exercising in pretty much the same outfits, according to gender. Men wore muscle-man tights, Jack Lalanne style with tank tops and women wore high school gym suits or pedal-pushers and Keds.
The men were always lifting weights with a lot of grunting and looking about to see if the fairer sex were watching. The women, still coiffed and made up from their workday; put their fannies on vibrating belts. Rows of fannies harnessed in vibrating belts, threatening to work off the flab or hurl their rears into outer space, one or the other!
They would then lean back with their whole body shaking, but with the June Cleaver smiles and poise that were obligatory in that day. My Mother wore black leotards. Welcome to my upbringing!
After the Gym era and the dawn of women’s lib, exercising became more fashion statement and hook-up opportunity than health and exercise. All that sexual eye-balling and gold razor blade jewelry, I’m sure, lay grounds for the obesity in old folks today!
I think senior guys and dolls don’t go to the gym, as a rule, so that they’re not forced to be eyeballed and critiqued by the opposite sex.
This FASHIONGRANNY history lesson is important groundwork for my current beef about the joggers of today. I will start with the men.
PUT YOUR SHIRT ON IF YOU ARE FLABBY AND COVERED WITH BODY HAIR! Good Lord! If I never see another old man limping across the bridge toward downtown, with breasts and white fur on his torso, it’’ll be too soon!
Come on Man! Yes! It’s great that you are exercising, keeping the old heart beating, etc. but have you ever thought that you are ancient and half naked, and some peeps – like me – want a half naked man ONLY in her bedroom? A half naked man of MY desire!
You are forcing me to take you into my eyeshot; I’m an unwilling hostage at best! It’s truly un-nerving! I drive to town from the serenity of my Island and as I approach the general hub-bub, to be jerked into that sight, for me is no different that seeing a dead squirrel on my country road. It’s startling and I always say,” I’m sorry,” and make a poopie sad lip.
Now, if the jogger were a healthy and strapping young handsome fit man, would I say the same thing and feel the same way? Good question.
Basically yes. Only my adjectives would change. I still would notice his nakedness. A malaise would overcome me and I would try to remember the kind of September I’ll never have again. Truly depressing! I have enough of that reflected in the mirror, thank you very much!
Women! Put on a Sports Bra or swaddling or something please!
Back in the early days of “jogging,” doctors told us that we MUST wear brassieres when we run for medical reasons. I can’t remember those reasons, but I remember something about your bosom going South at an early age if it was not “stabilized” while enduring that entire blunt force trauma! So, Sports Bras were invented to keep your boobs from jumping, swinging, flying or knocking out your eyeball! What happened Ladies?
I’ll tell you again, if I never see another chick almost naked running with “the girls” flapping up and down, up and down, and in hardly any clothing…. Well! Don’t get upset when Jimmy Crack Corn whistles or leers… or worse, corners you and tries his worst come on! You have no clothes on, girl!
The World today cannot differentiate between Healthy clothing and Sexy clothing. After all, they have the same thing in common. Less is more.
Ok, I’ve got a roll going. Can I address bare midriffs as well? Stop it! Stop it now!
In a civilized world, most folks appreciate healthy co-occupants. It’s so nice to see our fellow human beings dressed well, groomed and decent. No, we don’t all have the same taste, but cleanliness is next to Godliness and most of us fall into that category.
When something’s out of order, no matter what the “mode” of today denotes, it’s out of order and we know it.
Naked people running in the street are out of order. There is just no getting around that, and I ask that you who are exercising in public be more mindful of that. It’s just not fashionable!
Gotta go now! It takes me a while to put on my armor so that I may go for MY jog in the swamp where nobody will see me!
