Tenth in line for a fitting room!
If I’m not the most festive person around Christmastime, I come by it honestly. I’ve endured lost packages, ice storms, my father passing, and retail. This year, I’d resolved to make the most of the season as a gift to my wife and daughter, but fate wasn’t having any of it. December’s crescendo was on the second when Texas finally won the Big XII championship in football. From there my spirit perished to a thousand cuts.
My work year ended in the early afternoon of the 22nd, cause in itself to celebrate. However, when I arrived home, my wife was in bed, dead to the world. I would later find out that she was feeling lousy and had learned she’d been exposed to the Fauci Flu earlier in the week. She went back to bed, and I went upstairs. An officially licensed government test confirmed our fears the next afternoon. Our Christmas plans would be changed drastically; the three of us housebound until at least Boxing Day.
Despite the isolation, our daughter did well for herself on Christmas, per usual. More gifts were dropped by her grandparents and aunt on the porch, and she reveled in her expanding wardrobe. There was one gift that would have to be returned.
It was a pair of athletic shorts, a logical gift as our daughter is an athlete and can always use items like this. The garment in question was from Lululemon, a company that specializes in high-end athletic apparel. Retailing at $68, these running shorts barely concealed the bottom I cleaned and powdered not that long ago. The tag said they were Hotty Hot Low Rise Lined Run Shorts. Her mother and I agreed she’d need a larger size or larger garment.
The day after Christmas, I was dispatched to run bona fide old man errands, visiting two pharmacies and picking up cold cuts and Dijon mustard. By afternoon, my daughter was restless and twitching from the Christmas cash that was burning a hole in her tights. She wanted to visit the local Lululemon store to exchange her gift.
This sort of task typically falls within my wife’s jurisdiction, but she was hardly up to getting out. Furthermore, it would’ve been irresponsible for her to be in a store full of people.
Fortunately, I was available. A persistent daughter and four days of virtual house arrest prevented me from thinking everything through and I acquiesced. With careful instructions from my wife, we were off.
The local Lululemon is near our old neighborhood; the same freeway exit with the same paradoxes. Shuttered businesses shared blocks with upscale merchants and barhopping hipsters ambulated through the streets and sidewalks with shoppers seeking post-holiday bargains. Things had changed very little in the two years since we fled for the suburbs. Most of it I didn’t miss.
The store was packed. I don’t know what the official capacity is, but there appeared to be enough shoppers to arouse the suspicions of the fire marshall should he have happened to drop by. The check-out line bisected the store and stretched to within five feet of the door. The thud of uptempo electronic music urged movement in a space where there was no room to move. I immediately wished I had an extra Zoloft.
Our remit, more suited for a lower traffic afternoon–was to exchange the Hotty Hot Low Rise Run shorts for either something larger or two sale items.
The sale racks were identified only by a moat of humanity with women rapaciously grabbing items like migrant fruit pickers. To shop required a certain bold fortitude. The good news is my daughter found two items she liked. She’d be able to get two pieces for the one exchange–plus a bit of her Christmas cash. We were in business. The only question was fit.
Securing a fitting room also meant enduring a wait. This line, toward the rear of the store, was about half as long but didn’t move nearly as fast. Wedged in safety between a wall and a garment rack, I was able to relax and take in the surroundings. Most of the customers were female–many high school or college-aged. Some were accompanied by male companions with awful haircuts. Some younger girls dragged moms and grandmas through the crowded store making cases as to why they needed a $100 pair of tights. Also represented were the wine mommies in their chic workout gear and ill-fitting baseball caps.
Once my daughter was assigned a fitting room, I searched for a dead spot to wait for her. Looking at the clientele, I realized just how out of place I appeared. It was as awkward as when I realized I’d aged out of American Eagle. Lululemon caters to those with flat stomachs and long legs. I possess neither. I stood trying to appear as though I had business being in such a place, scratching at my beard, besmirched by patches of gray.
As the owner of an unopened marketing degree, I find these things fascinating. Once the apparel of apathy, sweatpants have been slimmed down and rebranded as joggers. The resulting paradigm shift has turned athletic apparel into haute fashion.
It’s marketing genius. Items that used to sell five-for-$20 have been commandeered by high-end brand names. In many ways Lululemon makes Nike look like a middling Branding and Management group project. The Lululemon logo is small and often not in the most conspicuous place, but as they say, if you know, you know. It occurred to me that the logo looked like a mash-up of the Greek letter Omega and the That Girl logo. The latter half of this observation did nothing to improve my relevance.
Further, adding the word performance seems to have enhanced not only the utility but the quality of any item. The people at Russell Athletic must still be kicking themselves over this missed opportunity.
My daughter’s new items both fit, which was good news. The bad news is the checkout line now reached the front door, took a right, and snaked back toward the counter. The store was so crowded that anytime someone joined the line, the anti-theft alarm sounded. You can imagine how long it took for this to become gratingly annoying.
We conversed over the din as we spent the better part of an hour in line, looking at the dozens of heads in front of us, many bowed in the Apple prayer. To their credit, the staff was efficient and worked quickly. Not Chick-fil-A efficient, but pretty good nonetheless. Identifiable by the red branded cross-chest fanny packs, the staff looked like service dogs perusing the line for credit card customers and collecting hangars from customers. We had an exchange and were using cash. We would remain in line until the bitter end.
At the counter, we were helped by a delightful young lady whose smile was in direct defiance of her day’s work. The transaction was quick, and we weaved our way toward the door, craving space and fresh air and feeling as though we’d been paroled.
My daughter, while happy with her apparel, was in no hurry to return. I’d been skeptical initially, but admittedly, the men’s lightweight performance hoodie was pretty cool. And $118 really isn’t that bad for a high-end shirt.
Plus that logo. That damned logo.
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