After, reading Stallybrass’s essay “Worn Worlds” it made me remember some of the things I had gone through when both of my grandfathers passed away.

When my maternal grandfather passed away in 2007, I was devastated. I can remember sitting in his room staring at his closet. Touching all of his clothes and realizing he wouldn’t ever wear these again. It wasn’t the clothes hanging in the closet that made me sad. It was when I opened all of his dresser draws looking at his socks all neatly flipped together. Digging through these draws rapidly trying to find some lasting piece of him I could hold on to. It has been almost 10 years since he passed and I repurposed a lot of his things so that I always have a part of him near me. Even though nothing will bring back the person that filled out these clothes having pieces of his clothing helps me feel safe and with him.

My paternal grandfather passed away in January. Before he died he asked my family to come into his closet. He wanted to get rid of his clothes. At first, I did not want to be a part of because he was still alive and it felt in bad taste to talk about you not being around anymore. But why his clothing? Why did he want to get rid of it before he died? To make sure it ended up in the right hands?

He asked each of my sisters and me, to pick out a hat. I really didn’t want a hat because in my head he wasn’t actually going to die. I did anyway to make him happy. He desperately wanted to give my dad his suit and cuff links. He claimed the only nice pieces of clothing he owned (it is true). But isn’t it weird, you are dying and wanting your clothes to be safe?  He passed away about 3 weeks later and my grandmother dumped all of his clothing almost immediately. Which I felt heartbroken about and I just don’t know why?

My maternal grandmother has moved in with my family. She is battling with Alzheimer’s which is extremely hard to watch. She loved clothing and dressing up and going out to parties. She sold her house last year and gave me a gift she wanted me to have. It was a custom dress she had had made for a cruise to see Frank Sinatra. She is from a small poor town and to her this $300 custom made dress was everything. She wanted me to have it because she knew I would keep it safe when she couldn’t remember anymore. Every now and then she will have a spark and ask me where her dress is. I assure her the dress is safe with me and I will always keep it safe.

A piece of clothing that I have that holds some type of power is a dress my grandmother gave me. The dress holds so much sentimental value to her. It is a custom made sequined dress that she wore to a Frank Sinatra concert with my grandfather for their wedding anniversary. I don’t practically love the dress and I probably will never wear it but she holds that dress so dear that it makes it valuable to me.

She recently had to sell her house and move in with my family because of her Alzheimer’s diagnosis.  When she came upon the dress, she made sure to give it to me because of my interest in fashion. My mom explained to me that this dress was her favorite thing and wanted to know it would always be safe. This is why I have it now. My mom told me it was a really big deal for to purchase this dress.

It is crazy to me that with her memory slipping, she can still hold onto the memory of that dress. Every time, she remembers it she will ask if it is safe. I make sure I let her know I still have it and it is in perfect condition. She can then go into a story of exactly what happe
ned when she wore the dress and how excited and happy she was. Because this dress brings my grandma so much happiness and great memories it holds a powerful meaning for me.

September 26th, 2017

Blog Post #1: Recap of the first Day, Meet our Team!

Sarah L, Aviva G, Sarah S, Sehara G

For our team project, we created a skirt of memories. All the members of our team contributed a T-shirt that served as a sentimental representation of our transition to college students: mainly, how we will move into this new chapter of our lives while still holding onto the previous ones. Sarah Ls’ T-shirt was one which she made herself in camp when she was ten years old. Being in college now, she looks back fondly at her youth in summer camp. She is determined to take the happiness and enthusiasm she displayed as a young girl in summer camp and bring that to the professional setting she is now in. Aviva donated a shirt that was given to her by her older sister who has since moved away. Once her sister moved away, Aviva saw her less frequently, and both she and her sister had to put in effort to make those reunions happen. Even though Aviva being busy with college life adds to this difficulty, she is determined to not leave her relationship with her sister behind. The T-shirt Sarah S. contributed is once which while volunteering at  traveling camp. While homework now takes up a significant amount of Sarah’s time, she will not let this stop her from volunteering regularly as she did before the transition to college life. Sehara’s T-shirt was given to her by a friend from before college. While a big part of college life is the social aspect and making new friends, Sehara is committed to staying in touch with friends from her childhood and younger years, and nurture those relationships while fostering new ones. Together, we used T-Shirts to create a project that represents what we are determined not to leave behind while making the exciting transitions to college life. In addition, we chose a skirt specifically, because of a religious dress code we all share that entails us wearing skirts. We are proud of our culture and happy to express that.

When my mother passed away a few years ago, I was not able to sift through her clothes and shoes.  I did not have a problem going through her jewelry, skincare products or fragrances yet I could not get myself to look inside her wardrobe.  In opening her closet and drawers, touching the fabrics she held so close to her body and smelling her familiar scent, the recollections and memories would have been too much to bear.  Recalling when she wore a top, jacket, skirt or pair of slacks to work, during a holiday or at a family gathering – I would not be able to bear the memories.  There was absolutely no way I would have been able to touch her clothes – it was too painful.  Had I sifted through her closet and touched her clothes, I would have felt I was violating her privacy; I did not have the right to touch her belongings.       

I remember clearly the day my sister, niece and I arrived at my mother’s apartment after the funeral service.  It was unbearable – I love my mother so much that I could not stand to look or touch her belongings; it was as if her presence was everywhere.   As I gazed around her empty home, I saw her image all over, how she occupied space – sitting at the dining room table, on the sofa reading the Times and cooking in the kitchen. 

My sister and niece sifted through my mother’s closet.  They selected, examined and filtered through her dresses, slacks, outerwear and shoes.  These items held my mom’s “gestures, both reassuring and terrifying, touching the living with the dead” (36) and of course her smell.  Yes, my mother’s clothes and possessions were there, but her body was gone.  As stated by Stallybrass, “When a person is absent or dies, cloth can absorb his or her absence presence” (38).  This is precisely the reason why I could not partake in removing and packing my mother’s belongings – the task was too overpowering for me.  Consequently, my sister and niece packed our mother’s clothes in boxes while I made idle chatter and pretended to organize random items.  My sister and niece kept most of my mother’s possessions which they keep in their attics.  Occasionally my sister will search through a box and select a blouse or blazer to wear.  She says it keeps her close to our mother.  As described by Stallybrass regarding Allon White’s jacket, he “was inhabited by his presence, taken over.  If I wore the jacket, Allon wore me.” My sister as well feels that wearing our mother’s clothes would give her the sense of our mother wearing her.   I, on the other hand will never be able to look through the boxes and wear an item, as nine years later, it still hurts.  

I was rather impressed with my sibling’s ability to handle the removal of my mother’s possession; how my sister and niece were strong, kept their feelings hidden, yet all I felt was “absence, darkness, death, things which are not” and would never be the same, a sense of nothingness, nothing would be the same again.  I could not touch the cloth, because every item symbolized a time, a day, an event spent with the person I most loved.      

Unlike Laurence Lerner’s father who got rid of his wife’s clothes when she passed, my sister will never donate mother’s clothes or take to a second-hand shop.  In doing so, would seem as if we are discarding my mother’s memory, as if putting an end to something that was; as if our mother never existed, erasing my mother’s life. 

Mother’s clothes are saturated with her shape, smell and gestures.  Her hands touched every piece of clothing she wore.  As a result, it is too painful for me to handle her clothes. My mother is “there in the wrinkles of the elbows, wrinkles which in the technical jargon of sewing are called “memory” …” (36).