March 4, 1987
Last week my thirteen year old daughter claimed she desperately needed new slacks. After school and before the evening activities began we made a quick trip to a local store which was having a remodeling sale.
There was definite, major remodeling taking place with workmen everywhere sweeping up dirt, taking up flooring, putting in wiring, etc.
Luckily for us the fitting rooms were nearly finished. A man on a ladder above the rooms agreed to leave his perch while Michelle promised to make a quick selection. After opening the door several times to exchange times and opinions it was time to leave. However, instead of my daughter exiting the fitting room I heard the door knob rattle and a faint voice saying, “Mom, I can’t get the door open.”
While she jiggled the knob the from inside I pulled at it from the outside. The sales clerk got her key, a workman tried his screwdriver – nothing worked.
Workmen gathered and instructions were voiced back and forth. One man finally decided to work his way under the door into the room and try from the inside. (I was so glad that wasn’t Michelle’s clothes dragging through the dust on the floor.)
“What do you want for dinner?” someone asked.
“I don’t understand what happened, it was working fine just a while ago,” someone else offered.
After a few minutes the decision was made to remove the door and my a daughter with her desired purchases emerged. Looking at her I could only laugh. I thought my fitting room hassle days were over. It seems a very short time ago that I was trying to maneuver a stroller with toddler, preschooler, packages and myself into a small space to try on clothes.
There were always such interesting things to do (besides look at myself in the mirror) such as pick up all the straight pins off the floor, move the furniture to make more room for everybody and their carry-a-long toys, keep sticky fingers off the clothes and discourage the opening of the other curtains and doors on our way in and out.
It got to the point I chose my clothes on the size and condition of the fitting room at the store. Is it any wonder I never had a coordinated wardrobe?
CCW