Been there, done that, got the T-shirt

 

1 In 1944 during the second day of the D-Day invasion, my father landed on a Normandy beach in France with the rest of his regiment. The enemy defences had been weakened by the first day’s assault, but in some places along the beach, there was still some resistance, with occasional gunfire. Within 24 hours my father had been wounded. “I forgot to dodge the bullet,” he said. He and the other casualties were sent back to England to recover. Fortunately, the wound was superficial. The bullet had grazed the fleshy inner part of his left arm, and he recovered fairly quickly.

2 My father had been allowed to keep his old battle jacket, and when, as a child, I asked him to tell me about his adventures during the Second World War, he would always take the jacket out of the trunk in the loft, and show me the bullet hole. “Five centimetres to the right …” he said, but was too tactful to finish the sentence, … and it would have gone straight through his heart, a mortal wound. He said he kept the jacket to remind him how he had nearly died.

3 The original, prehistoric purpose of clothes was purely functional – they needed to be warm and waterproof, and to protect our modesty. Even today, we often have to make choices about dressing for comfort in low-maintenance clothes and dressing for fashion. In the damp and freezing countries of Northern Europe, there’s a Scandinavian saying: “There’s no such thing as bad weather, just the wrong clothing”, implying because there’s nothing we can do about our climate, we might as well bow to the inevitable and dress in warm clothes.

4 But today, do we still dress exclusively for comfort? Or do we also dress for fashion? Fashionistas – followers of the latest fashions – choose to wear the season’s fabulous new designs and colours, often at the expense of comfort and practicality. Many of them love the glamour of the fashion shows in Milan, Paris, London and New York. They like to gauge and witness the latest trends as worn by models of uniform build and exquisite beauty, who are quite unlike most ordinary people. Some of the fashionistas end up as fashion victims, whose choice of clothes is dictated by a sense of extravagant style but who are so self-absorbed that they’re unable to realize how inappropriate it is. They accordingly run the risk of inviting an unkind response.

5 Others choose clothes to make a favourable impression of some kind on the people they meet in particular circumstances, such as a smart suit and a crisp, white shirt for a job interview, or a beautiful gown for their wedding. Even people who dress down in the evenings or at the weekend – loafers, jeans, polo shirts – often choose colours, combinations and brands which suit them. Finally, those people who claim to have no interest in fashion usually choose sombre colours as a form of camouflage, to disguise themselves and to avoid attracting attention to themselves.

6 But fashion has two other, possibly more important functions. Firstly, it can allow us to express or reflect our emotions through the clothes we wear. Our favourite clothes are those which we choose most often to reveal positive aspects of our personality - fun and funky, or smart and businesslike. Our wardrobes are largely filled with our favourites, because they make us feel good and fit for purpose.

7 Yet surely alongside those favourite outfits are others which have fallen out of favour. Maybe there’s a pair of jeans you can’t get into anymore, or a sweater which has grown a bit too loose, or something in a colour or fabric which seemed fashionable at the time, but which isn’t quite right for today. So why don’t we throw these out?

8 This is the other important function of fashion: a sense of occasion. We bought those clothes when we were adolescents -- slimmer or more carefree. We wore them on a romantic first date which didn’t work out. We chose them specially for a wedding or a funeral, and keep them ready for similar future events.

9 Your wedding dress remains protected under wraps even though you’re unlikely ever to wear it again (well, even if you remarry, surely you won’t do so in the same dress!). There’s the suit you wore for the interview for a job you didn’t get. An old school tie reminds you of years of education, with its many emotional highs and lows. Maternity wear reminds mothers of their nervous excitement during their pregnancy, waiting for the baby to arrive. Baby clothes remind us of those few short years when our children were helplessly dependent on us, of how tiny they were, and how they’ve grown in every way since then. The old sweater belonging to a dead parent keeps alive the memory of their special scent …

10 We keep clothes which remind us of the difference between what we wanted to be at one point of our lives, and what we are today. Dubious red trousers, purple tank tops, long necklaces, high leather boots, multi-coloured sneakers, a broad-brimmed hat bought after watching a film from the Fifties, shoes with heels so high that the first and only outing wearing them to a club one evening led to a night in A&E with a twisted ankle, the ubiquitous I ♥ NY … Been there, done that, got the T-shirt.

11  Our clothes are indicative of our lives, the events, the emotions, the sense of nostalgia for yesterday’s innocence and the chastening, humbling reminder of who we are today.

12 When my father showed me his battle jacket, I used to slip my finger through the hole, and as he told his stories of what he was thinking on that beach in Normandy in 1944, I was thinking of what he said, “Five centimetres to the right... “  and  I  wouldn’t be here today.

 

到过某地、做过某事、买过那件 T 恤衫

 

1      1944年，诺曼底战役的第2天，我父亲和军团的战友一起登陆法国诺曼底海滩。敌军的防守火力因第一天受到猛攻而变弱了，但沿岸有些地方还有一些敌人在抵抗，能听到零星的枪声。上战场不到24小时我父亲就负伤了。他说：“我忘了躲子弹了。”他和其他伤兵被送回英国养伤。幸好他受的只是外表皮肉伤——子弹擦过左臂内侧肌肉，他很快就康复了。

2    我父亲获准留下了战场上穿过的那件军装夹克。我小时候每次让他讲他在二战中的冒险经历时，他都会从阁楼的箱子里翻出那件军服，让我看上面的弹孔。“如果向右偏5厘米……”他说，但是他很小心，没把话说完……子弹就直接穿透他的心脏了，那可是致命伤。他说他保存这件衣服，是为了提醒自己当年怎么差点就牺牲了。

3     衣服最初的、史前的用途纯粹是功能性的——它们必须保暖、防水、遮羞。即便是现在，我们经常要在两类衣服之间做挑选：一种是舒适又不太需要保养的衣服，还有一种是时髦的衣服。北欧国家的天气潮湿冰冷，斯堪的纳维亚人有句俗语说：“没有恶劣的天气，只有穿错的衣服。”这意味着既然我们无法改变天气，我们不妨向不可避免的事情低头，穿暖和的衣服。

4     可如今我们穿衣服还只是为了舒适吗？抑或也为了时髦？时尚潮人——那些追逐最新款时装的人——选择本季度最新款式及流行色的时装，这么做往往是以牺牲舒适度及实用性为代价的。他们中许多人无法抵挡米兰、巴黎、伦敦及纽约时装秀的魅力，他们到那里去鉴赏并见证由身材标准、相貌出众的模特儿所展示的服装最新趋势，这些模特儿跟大多数普通人不一样。有些时尚潮人甚至最后沦落为时尚的牺牲品：他们的着装选择完全被追求奢华风格的心态所主宰，但是因为固执己见，他们意识不到这种风格不适合他们。他们因此常常会遭人白眼。

5     另一些人选择服装的目的则是为了在特定场合能给会面者留下良好的印象，比如在参加面试时穿上时髦笔挺的西服及整洁干净的白衬衫，或者在他们的婚礼上穿上一身漂亮的礼服。即便是晚上下班后或周末穿便装——平底鞋、牛仔裤、开领短袖衫等——他们也要仔细挑选适合自己的颜色、搭配和品牌。最后，还有那些声称对时装没有兴趣的人，他们往往会选择暗色的衣服作掩护，伪装自己，避免吸引别人的目光。

6     但时装还有另外两种可能更重要的功用。其一，它让我们能通过我们穿着的服装表达或反映我们的情感。我们最喜欢的衣服是那些我们最常挑选，并最能展示我们个性中积极面——有趣、时髦或者帅气、务实——的衣服。我们衣柜里大都堆满了我们喜欢的衣服，因为它们让我们感觉舒适、得体。

7     不过可以肯定的是，除了这些我们最喜欢的衣服之外，还有我们不再喜欢的衣服。可能是一条已经窄得穿不进去的牛仔裤、一件变得松松垮垮的毛衣、一件颜色或衣料在当时看起来挺时髦而现在却很老土的衣服。那我们为什么不把它们扔掉呢？

8     这就涉及时装的另一个重要功能：为某些场合营造气氛。我们青少年时期购买的衣服比较瘦，或比较随意，我们曾经穿上这种衣服去赴第一次无果的约会。我们也特地为某个婚礼或葬礼选购服装，我们还保存这些服装以备将来在类似的场合穿。

9     结婚礼服虽然不太可能会再穿了，但你仍然会将其包好存放起来（嗯，就算你再婚，你也决不会再穿旧礼服的！）。还有第一次面试失败时穿过的西服、一条能让你回忆起求学岁月里情感起落的校友领带、让母亲们想起怀孕待产时激动不安心情的孕妇装；婴儿服让我们想起孩子们小时候有那么短短几年是那么无助地依赖我们，那么弱小，以及后来他们是怎么在各方面成长起来的； 还有过世的前辈留下的旧毛衣，它让我们能闻到长辈留下的特殊的气味……

10    我们保存某些衣服，是为了让我们想起生命中某个时期理想的自我与如今现实的自我之间的差异。颜色不正的红裤子、紫色的紧身背心、长长的项链、高筒皮靴、五颜六色的运动鞋、看完一部50年代的电影后买的宽边帽、高跟鞋（跟太高了，第一次，也是唯一一次傍晚穿着它去俱乐部，结果那天晚上我就扭伤脚踝，进了医院的急诊室）、还有随处可见的I ♥ NY（我爱纽约）T恤衫…… 到过某地、做过某事、买过那件 T恤衫。

11       我们的服装表明了我们的生活、经历、情感，以及我们对往昔纯真时代的怀旧之情。它们训诫我们，使我们更加谦卑，提醒我们认清自己的身份。

12       我父亲给我看他的军装夹克时，我曾用手指穿过衣服上的弹孔。当他在回忆1944年在诺曼底海滩上他在想什么时，我则在回味他说过的那句话：“如果向右偏５厘米……”那今天我就不会在这儿了。