I’m addicted to Goodwill
Yesterday someone cut me off in traffic and I went to Goodwill and bought four dresses and a leather skirt out of spite. I parked all wrong, too: my car took up two parking spots, and when I noticed this, I continued to walk into Goodwill, raising my hand up to press the 'lock' button on my keys, almost like a dance, or a trance, into shopping oblivion.
When I'm stressed I 'thrift.' I go into Goodwill, or whatever boutique sells reused clothes, and I buy clothes. I love fashion, but it's not even that: it's the thrill of the find. Yesterday one of the dresses I bought was a scarlet red, floor-length dress with creases in the bottom half, making it look like crepe. The whole front has buttons up it, not the kind you can actually button, just decorative pieces of joy (also red). There's a Peter Pan collar and cuffs that have the same red buttons that adorn the front, but they snap shut, closing off my wrists like delicate jailers. I am absolutely in love. I pull it off the rack and I have. to. have it.
Then there's the leather skirt I mentioned. I was actually, when I found it, looking for a black slip, to place under one of the four dresses I was also going to buy. Unfortunately, that dresses is see-through. But I love the pattern so much (blue and black stripes haphazardly splayed like bold streaks of paint all over the dress), that I was now searching for a slip. A slip? I know. My mom once told me to buy a slip and I said, "What, like it's 1988?" But this time it was relevant.
I searched the skirts section. Usually this is risky: I usually search for floor-length, work-appropriate skirts. Usually, they only have either 1) entirely too dowdy skirts even for me or 2) see-through (again!) skirts or 3) too short skirts. I was looking for that slip (and asking a Goodwill employee would be too much effort), so I was frantically whipping through the available selection, and finding nothing. Then, I see it - right smack dab in the middle of the skirts section. A leather skirt.
Leather is tricky because it can (perhaps obviously) be too tight. This leather skirt was a size medium. I assessed the waist: very stretchy, even forgiving. I put it over my arm. It was a "must-have" clothing purchase. (It turned out to be too big later, around the waist, no less. But such is The Risk Of The Thrift.)
One of the four dresses is a pink, skin-tight dress with almost a translucent appearance, with a seventies collar. When I say seventies collar, I mean it looks like it's straight out of a space comedy from that decade: the collar is raised, and goes around my neck about two inches away from my actual neck. Like a space helmet should be placed on top of it. When I was considering placing it on my arm at Goodwill (the ultimate 'this is a Final Find') I was worried it would be too tight. It turned out to be yes, tight, but not too tight.
You're probably wondering why I don't just try these on at the actual Goodwill, before buying them and taking them home. During Covid, the fitting rooms were outright closed off - and even now, some are still closed. There are, however, a couple fitting rooms still available - but for me, it's the thrill of the not knowing. Not knowing if they'll end up fitting, a surprise for later. (They almost always fit once I get home - I'm good at 'eyeballing' the fit of clothes.) Will the see-through dress be all wrong? We'll see. Is the scarlet red dress going to flow the way I want it to? Maybe. It's all up to chance, to fate, to the gods that be.
Maybe I'm a Goodwill addict. And after writing all this, I'm realizing it just makes me so incredibly happy to shop there. But there's a limit. Here's me, airing my personal grievance to myself: I thrift too much, and I need to stop, possibly with the leather skirt, possibly with my next (and final! ) purchase.