The Postscript: Stretch pants lifestyle

I don’t remember exactly when I took to living in stretch pants full time.

The process was gradual, I’m sure of that. I started out wearing a pair of bell-bottom stretch pants when I was writing. I didn’t actually live in them; they were part of my writing costume and they were comfy.

But as the pandemic wore on, I noticed the legs of my stretch pants were getting longer and longer until, one day, I saw they were covering my feet, and it was not a very respectable look.

“I need to upgrade my stretch pants!” I decided.

So, I bought stretch pants with pockets. Pockets in stretch pants are completely useless because you can’t put anything in them without it looking as if you have a growth on your leg. A credit card makes a bump. A key looks like the beginnings of a tumor.

But the pockets signaled that these stretch pants were almost like regular pants. They just stretched. They were certainly less disreputable looking than the stretch pants that covered my feet. I started wearing them most of the day.

In the late afternoon, I take my hike and that’s when I put on my second pair of stretch pants.

“There’s nothing wrong with hiking in stretch pants!” I remind myself. “These are athletic stretch pants!”

My hiking stretch pants look nothing at all like the stretch pants I just took off because they are not bell-bottoms and they don’t have pockets. I wear them exclusively on my hike, and they are a little worn out because dogs jump up on them and bushes snag them. You would certainly never mistake them for my regular stretch pants, the ones I wear the rest of the day.

But one day I got home from my hike, took a hot bath and thought, “Wouldn’t it be nice to just slip into something comfy like ... maybe stretch pants?”

That was when I brought out my old stretch pants, the disreputable ones that cover my feet, and put them on.

“I can look a little disreputable in the evening!” I figured.

These stretch pants are not as tight as the stretch pants with pockets, and they are a bit heavier, which is nice on a cool night. I think of them as my “casual stretch pants,” and I wear them as I make my dinner and lounge about in the evening.

Then one night while getting ready for bed, I put on my nightgown and I had an epiphany. “What I need is nighttime stretch pants!”

I wouldn’t wear my stretch pants with pockets, of course. That would be ridiculous. I wouldn’t wear the tight stretch pants that I wear on my hike and dogs jump all over, nor would I need anything as substantial as my casual evening stretch pants.

I found a pair of stretch pants that were loose and made of a lighter fabric and, I am here to tell you, paired with a nightgown, they are the perfect pajamas.

So now I move through my day, from one pair of stretch pants to the next, marking the movement of the sun across the sky like a sundial by changing into a different pair of stretch pants -- pants that might appear (to the untrained eye) strikingly similar in appearance.

There’s talk that we all may be able to get out and about more in the near future. Of course, I’m delighted. But it does seem like a bit of a shame since I just perfected my stretch pants lifestyle.

Till next time,

Carrie

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Carrie Classon’s memoir is called, “Blue Yarn.” Learn more at CarrieClasson.com.