Women's Wear Nightly

JEFFERSON COUNTY, Mo. - The un-insulated bedroom, a 1969 addition to the Divine Cabin, presents a heating challenge typically addressed by a heated mattress pad, flannel sheets, a space heater and inch-thick insulation taped over the single-pane windows, but on harsher nights those are not enough, and one must, in addition, consider one's jammies.

Besides being sleepwear, jammies are often worn all morning, or down to the mailbox, topped with a parka. Stone-washed in well water at least weekly, by April the pair that was new in autumn is rags, or only one-half of the jammie set survives, as with the blue-striped Lanz pajama bottoms pictured here smartly teamed with a coral-colored long-sleeved Calida henley top for up-to-the-minute bedtime fashion flair, both in pure cotton.

Lanz of Salzburg and Calida of Switzerland sell quality Euro-jammies and undies able to survive this lifestyle for several winters. The Lanz jammie pants are four winters old, the coral Calida top, five. One multi-colored striped Calida nightie has shared the wearer's bed for three winters and she looks forward to more. After its annual laundering it smells divine! From the label Joe Boxer, sold at Sears and K-Mart and sewn in Bangladesh, this season's statement jammies feature stylized melon- and cherry-colored hearts, and the buttons on the top are hot pink glitter, and one can only imagine the thoughts of the workers in the sweatshop in Bangladesh.

Observers have responded to the heart-print jammies thus: 1) "That looks like a clown suit" and 2) "Hearts all over, soooo cute!" What people think and say about your leisurewear is so important! Never think it's beneath the fashion radar!

I Want to Be Cute

Before	After
(Note: I had just removed a hat.)	Ninety minutes later.

Fallen in love at first sight: 48 percent of men have; only 28 percent of women. (Citation.) From the back of the pack I've been watching as men at events -- middle-aged events such as networking, singles, and hikes -- go straight for the blondes, falling in starry-eyed love right there in front of me. Kitchen-sink bleach-bottle blonde with an inch of dark roots doesn't matter, weathered skin and a voice like a foghorn don't matter. I'm fitter, thinner, better educated, very cute, or, in a tight dress, a ringer for an exotic Russian spy. Doesn't matter. In Jefferson County, 7 of  every 10 white women can be classified as blond because they've been quicker to learn that blondes have more fun. I've examined this issue from every angle, and it is what it is. A woman who hasn't clearly and deliberately altered her natural appearance might as well be a man.

My natural hair color resembles 80-percent-cacao chocolate. I've never colored it. Furthermore it's short. I think I'm wonderful. But, maybe it's just wintertime, I consulted my hairdresser, who thought I'd make a terrible blonde and suggested highlights instead. I made an appointment for the very next day.

Now my hair is more like a peanut butter cup. Come hither, gentlemen! Let me sort YOU out by your hairlines.

Let's Talk Pink Camouflage

Walmart.com

It used to be that you needed only to wear blue denim to be perfectly in step with Jefferson County high fashion. If you didn't wear blue denim, you carried a blue denim handbag. You had to have blue denim on you somewhere, and the senior women pushed that envelope by accessorizing with Indian turquoise jewelry. Then the sleeveless, zip-front vest became a must-have. I own several, much to the dismay of a city friend who could not help but remark on the coral-colored fleece vest I wore to lunch, although out of concern for city feelings I had left my shooting vest and my hunter-orange one at home. Then everyone who was anyone here bought pit bulls, and people middle-class and above bought bulldogs, which sound kind of the same.

These days you'd better wear UnderArmour. This brand of well-made, hard-wearing technical athletic clothing, $50 for a long-sleeved tee-shirt, sells like hotcakes, especially to the poor, who can now buy it from the farm & home stores that once sold only Dickies and Carhartt pants and John Deere logo wear. Even upper-middle-class Jefferson Countians wear UnderArmour caps. The local youth too cool for Under Armour clothing wear UnderArmour cross-training gym shoes.

Even so, don't come out here this autumn expecting acceptance into the highest circles unless you are wearing UnderArmour camouflage gear, specifically the pattern "Real Tree." Real Tree is carried even by Walmart, and, for the ladies, there's a line of pink "Real Tree" camouflage everything, lounge pants to aprons (see photo) to dinnerware.

Pink camouflage clothing bothers some people. Let me explain: It's the gingham of our time. The pink indicates acceptance of the wearer's femininity ("I am not a feminist") and the camouflage, tacit support for hunting and the U.S.military, and by extension, approval of a gun-toting lifestyle, and by further extension, a passion for the Second Amendment, which in turn conveys distaste for all things Obama. Pink camouflage indicates not only a "stand by your man" philosophy but a rightist form of patriotism. My own pink camouflage item is a ballcap emblazoned with "USA" in case its message isn't clear enough; I wear it hoping to be taken for a native. I like President Obama, but no one can tell. That's my camouflage.