Hunting for a specific item of clothing in my overcrowded wardrobe this morning, I reflected once again on the fact that I have too many clothes. Part of the problem is that although I am aware of the one-in one-out fashion philosophy recommended by a friend of mine (every time you buy a new item of clothing you should throw away something old) it’s very hard to throw out clothing that you still like or that “might come in useful”. Consequently some of my clothing is quite old - no, let’s be honest, very old. There are the favourite frocks that you keep on the grounds that you might lose those few extra pounds and get into them again. It does work! When long summer frocks became fashionable again I was quite pleased to be able to resurrect a couple of items from the last time such dresses were in vogue.
I can’t remember the last time I went shopping specifically for clothes. I’m more likely to see something irresistible and buy on impulse. And I confess to giving in to the temptation go and see what certain shops have on offer. But I’ve also been doing what my daughter calls “shopping your wardrobe”, in other words wearing items of clothing you’ve not worn for ages rather than buying something new. And I’ve made a conscious decision to ring the changes regularly: wearing stuff that I might once have kept for “special occasions” - make every day a special occasion! There is, however, a bag of really scruffy stuff in case I give in to the temptation to do some painting and decorating - a different kind of special occasion!
I have also done a trawl through the wardrobes, both mine and Phil’s, setting aside clothes which we accept will NEVER be worn again. We had a crazy afternoon where we gave the family a chance to go through this haul before sending it to a charity shop. Granddaughter Number Two claimed some of my reject sweaters and cardigans. Granddaughter Number One walked off with oversized lumberjack shirts and cord shirts that had been hiding in her grandfather’s clothes collection. Even our daughter took possession of a couple of quite formal white shirts of her father’s, declaring them just the thing to wear as cover-ups over T-shirts and shorts. So we’ve done our bit for recycling although we still have a couple of bags of stuff waiting to go to a charity shop!
Which brings me to a major world problem with clothing. Fast fashion has led to vast amounts of clothing being discarded. I remember discussions with my sixth form students about the morality or otherwise of buying cheap clothes from shops such as Primark, clothes which are cheap because they are produced in sweatshops somewhere in the third world. All in vain, of course. They wanted cheap, trendy outfits at a price that they could afford and which they could afford to wear maybe only once and then throw away!
Here’s a link to an article about the discarded clothes that end up in second hand markets in Ghana, the unwearable items dumped in places where much of it then gets washed out to sea and is washed ashore on the beaches of Ghana. We export our rubbish to places that cannot cope with it. The article blames the problem on fast-fashion but the labels the beach cleaners and sorted collect from the discarded items also include Marks and Spencer, Next and other outlets that hardly fit into the fast-fashion category.
It’s not just me who needs a radical rethink!
In other areas it seems we also over-use things. A huge example is antibiotics. I have long been an advocate of taking as little medication as possible, apart from vitamin supplements, to which I might be mildly addicted. But I can probably count on one hand the number of times when I have been prescribed antibiotics in the last twenty years. And now I’m reading about the growing threat of antimicrobial resistance (AMR). In Pakistan, for example, they are seeing the spread of drug-resistant typhoid: the over-used antibiotics no longer work. Will we find a new mind of cure-all?
Since I am clearly having a bit of a rant about how we are messing up the world, here’s an example of silliness in my own life. Cycling home from Uppermill market last Wednesday, as I pushed my bicycle round an obstacle I noticed that my rear light was missing. Had it bounced off when I went over some bumps? Or had somebody pinched it when the bike was chained up outside the co-op store. Either way, I was now minus a rear light. So we ordered a replacement which arrived today.
As you can see from my photo, the light itself is not very big and comes in a small box, maybe 4 inches by 5 inches. But that box arrived inside a much larger box, filled with scrumpled brown paper to stop it from rattling about too much. No way was that getting through a letterbox, so the delivery man had to knock at the door (especially as he did not recognise the much more audible doorbell - but that is a different matter altogether). Why did it need such a huge parcel? Who knows?
I have recycled the packaging, by the way
Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!
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