So Many Clothes

This weekend I began transferring my winter clothes to storage (plastic bins that will live in the basement until I move) and my summer clothes to my closet. My conclusion? I have a lot of damn clothes.

This will not come as a surprise to anyone who knows me. I like clothing, I like fashion history, I have a problem with clothing swaps and secondhand stores. What I put on my body is an important part of my life, though obviously not as important as my family and friends and under-educated children and a million other things. But it's fun to figure out what to pair with that skirt I could never quite work before, and the rest of my life feels much more manageable when I don't feel like a neglected Goodwill mannequin.

I'm starting to prepare to move in a little over a month, several states away. Most of my things will be in storage for at least a couple of months. It's coming down to a question of, "Do I like this thing enough to move it three times (into moving truck, into storage unit, into wherever I'll live next)?" A lot of the time the answer is yes. My clothes are part of my personal history, and I will never surrender my grandmother's cocktail dresses, or my box of dresses that are really only good for drunken makeover montages. The impending move is making it easier, though, to finally let go of the things that have never fit me, that are proportioned incorrectly or are in colors that do not suit my skintone. I'm also using it as motivation to give away pieces that do have sentimental value that has become more baggage than anything. For those things I try to find a friend who loves the given piece as much as I do. It's exponentially easier when I know something I've cared about will have a rich life with someone about whom I also care.

Is it silly to think this much about clothing? I don't think so. Things are only things, but most of the things I have are there for a reason. And the important ones will stay with me through twenty more moves.