2001-08-01 - 11:04 MDT

THE WONDERING JEW

Knickers

Hated word, hated thought. The term "knickers twisted" is a sort of modern term referring to my mood and feelings about knickers when I was in elementary school.

There, in my early years our dream as boys was to wear long pants and short socks which were symbols of the graduation from little boy to big boy. Our first graduation into maturity easily visible to other people's eyes.

It is hard for me to talk about my hatred for those damnable knickers, worn here as outerwear by us boys, without becoming vulgar. There was a problem of getting them to stay up at the proper length, and then having to cope with those terrible long stockings. They were headed either for my ankles or having to bear the restriction of garters, hidden above the lower edge of the knickers, very uncomfortable to my character and body then.

We started early at first discomfort and drooping socks to work on our parents, trying for the beloved long pants. I don't now what it was about grown folks then, or today for that matter - they are a weird breed unto themselves. Remind me to not grow up. Our pleas fell on deaf ears and evasive glances and at the most I would get the phrase, "We'll see," which could mean almost anything that the warped mind of an adult could conceive.

I had the feeling of a hopeless captive in those hated ball and chain garments, which made made them especially galling when the first kids in our group got long pants. Still my folks ignored my bent knee plea. It seemed that I lived through eternities, coping with that stupid get up. It was disconcerting to me to try to keep up a good appearance when visiting out. Of course later on down the line there were other challenges to a growing boy, to be faced and overcome. The victory of gaining long pants status prepared us for future challenges.

Finally, answering my begging and whining Mom and Dad got me long pants, oh happy day. Then came the next difficulty and challenge, as well as criticism from above. I would manage to green up my knees on the lawn when playing and those stains didn't come out. And worse yet was to fall on the sidewalk or black top and tear the knees requiring patching by hand -- that was before iron on patches were invented. That horrible thing happened to me when wearing my good pants to church with my cousins during a game of tag. I had my fanny tanned over that one.

It brought me up short to realize that long pants wasn't the ultimate solution for a little kid's bruised ego. Trying to keep the pants presentable and unwrinkled had to be learned as well as other esoteric procedures attendant to maintaining and wearing that status symbol of early maturity.

For a few years this boy lived in a world of twisted Knickers . . . . . .

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