clevermanka (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
clevermanka) wrote2010-10-01 09:02 am
clevermanka) wrote2010-10-01 09:02 am
Oh my stockings and garters
When I was a pre-teen, my mother tried to teach me how to put on my own tights. This was the way-early 80s, and heavy cable-knit cotton tights were popular and easily-found for little girls who liked to wear skirts in the winter months. My childhood body was shaped something like a potato, so skirts were a year-round necessity. Despite my mother's patient instruction, I still wound up with the cable pattern wonky, the waistband twisted out of shape, and the crotch somewhere around mid-thigh. By my teens, I'd graduated to Actual Pantyhose, and I never got more than three wearings out of a pair before I'd put a finger through the panty top or somewhere in the thigh.
Shortly before she died, my grandmother took me aside and said "Why don't you buy a garter belt and some stockings. They're easier. I never liked pantyhose, either." This, along, with her wedding ring and KitchenAid mixer, I count among her final and most precious gifts to me. I should note, this was a woman who didn't like underwear in general.
So, at the tender age of fifteen, I began my love affair with stockings and garter belts as a practical alternative to pantyhose. I didn't think of them as terribly sexy. They were simply a welcome relief to my struggles with that hated pantyhose waistband. Any prurient appeal took a backseat. A way back seat. Like the back-facing seat of an old station wagon back seat.
I remember the first time I put them on (for church!). I got them on perfectly (in short time, I would graduate to seamed hose with nary a crooked line), clipped them, and then paused. I put on my robe and headed out to the kitchen, where grandma sat with her coffee. "How do I go to the bathroom?" I asked. She didn't even look up from her newspaper. "If you're wearing shorts, they go on the outside."
After that, the only thing I didn't understand was why pantyhose had become so popular. The only use for them I could see was for wearing under miniskirts. I knew for darn sure that 90% of the women I saw wearing hosiery under their knee-length or longer skirts were not wearing stockings. I just couldn't understand why.
Now I know. Probably most of them didn't grow up with my grandma. Poor things.
Note: If you are interested in purchasing a practical garterbelt, not some silly frilly thing that wouldn't hold up a piece of paper much less a stocking, but don't know where to start looking, please see my suggestions in a comment to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
pointoforigin about garter belt styles.
Shortly before she died, my grandmother took me aside and said "Why don't you buy a garter belt and some stockings. They're easier. I never liked pantyhose, either." This, along, with her wedding ring and KitchenAid mixer, I count among her final and most precious gifts to me. I should note, this was a woman who didn't like underwear in general.
So, at the tender age of fifteen, I began my love affair with stockings and garter belts as a practical alternative to pantyhose. I didn't think of them as terribly sexy. They were simply a welcome relief to my struggles with that hated pantyhose waistband. Any prurient appeal took a backseat. A way back seat. Like the back-facing seat of an old station wagon back seat.
I remember the first time I put them on (for church!). I got them on perfectly (in short time, I would graduate to seamed hose with nary a crooked line), clipped them, and then paused. I put on my robe and headed out to the kitchen, where grandma sat with her coffee. "How do I go to the bathroom?" I asked. She didn't even look up from her newspaper. "If you're wearing shorts, they go on the outside."
After that, the only thing I didn't understand was why pantyhose had become so popular. The only use for them I could see was for wearing under miniskirts. I knew for darn sure that 90% of the women I saw wearing hosiery under their knee-length or longer skirts were not wearing stockings. I just couldn't understand why.
Now I know. Probably most of them didn't grow up with my grandma. Poor things.
Note: If you are interested in purchasing a practical garterbelt, not some silly frilly thing that wouldn't hold up a piece of paper much less a stocking, but don't know where to start looking, please see my suggestions in a comment to
pointoforigin about garter belt styles.
no subject
I have the same tights issues, I can't fit properly into any of the "size ranges'.
no subject
http://www.wolfordshop.co.uk/Legwear/cp500004950/cl1/vt01/
nothing NOTHING is cheap. but they do 'long'. i have been wearing basic black ones for donkey's years http://www.wolfordshop.co.uk/Cotton-Velvet/cp500004959/si500448817/cl2/vt01/
they remain soft after washing, unlike other brands, and, like i say, no pissy knicker sensation from them crawling down.
the fancy ones are fun, though probably not to be bought in quantity unless you are a millionaire or a shopping addict who is impervious to cost.