![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Century 21 is back in Manhattan (although all the old clothes went to Maine)
I watched the second World Trade tower fall on 9/11 from the deserted 5th Avenue in front of the library with the lions in front (Patience and Fortitude, in case you were wondering, and yes, I do read between them sometimes). I worked down there for a long time, in just about every office building surrounding the towers, although never in the towers themselves. I used the subway station underneath them to get to work when I had a job down there. I had bizarre dreams about the Exchange Place subway station for months.
Anyway, that day I went to the Citicorp Center to give blood. About a thousand of us waited on line for up to seven hours, and only about two hundred got in, near as I could tell, but it was something to do that might help, so we wanted to do it. Nobody talked very much. Lots of people stood the whole time, just because I think we didn't notice how long it had been. I was dazed. I kept being dazed for a long time.
One of the things that provoked a reaction from me, though, the way trivial things will because they're safe to concentrate on to keep the overwhelming things at bay, was that Century 21 was gone. They didn't know if they were going to open it again.
Century 21 is a discounter that sells designer stuff, mostly, of the "hey, I bet my reputation as a ball gown designer will make me madly marketable in the golf cleats market" variety. There's an awful lot of wearable stuff in that niche.
How do I love Century 21? Let me count the ways. I love that they have a children's department where kid's stuff, good kid's stuff, is cheaper than it is at KMart (I'm told). I love that they have a fully stocked fat chick department with a nice solid wall between it and the evening wear for emaciated people department. I love that I could find Timberland boots for the kid by sorting through a mountain of metallic pewter mules with four inch heels in a size that fits a four year old. (No, I didn't, in case you were wondering. Buy the mules, that is).
I love that they have tshirt-material sheet sets in four different colors and turkey platters with nauseous colored autumn leaves in relief strewn around them and crystal and linen napkins and brightly colored plastic phones and every men's designer known to western civilization and nightshirts with polar bears in stocking caps skating around on them.
I love that my daughter will occasionally try something on if I bribe her with something from their mountainous collection of vulgar children's accessories. I love that the most beautiful dress I've ever seen on a six year old was twenty dollars, with Isadora Duncan scarf, and that I found it on a rack with faux-leopard-trimmed stretch miniskirts and belly-freezer tops.
Sunday, we're shopping. I want to walk around and feel as if everything is normal and we could stop across the street at Borders for a reward if she tries on clothes without too much whining. I want the feeling, just for a few minutes, that there's something they didn't get. It's not much, but life's little victories don't have to be.
I watched the second World Trade tower fall on 9/11 from the deserted 5th Avenue in front of the library with the lions in front (Patience and Fortitude, in case you were wondering, and yes, I do read between them sometimes). I worked down there for a long time, in just about every office building surrounding the towers, although never in the towers themselves. I used the subway station underneath them to get to work when I had a job down there. I had bizarre dreams about the Exchange Place subway station for months.
Anyway, that day I went to the Citicorp Center to give blood. About a thousand of us waited on line for up to seven hours, and only about two hundred got in, near as I could tell, but it was something to do that might help, so we wanted to do it. Nobody talked very much. Lots of people stood the whole time, just because I think we didn't notice how long it had been. I was dazed. I kept being dazed for a long time.
One of the things that provoked a reaction from me, though, the way trivial things will because they're safe to concentrate on to keep the overwhelming things at bay, was that Century 21 was gone. They didn't know if they were going to open it again.
Century 21 is a discounter that sells designer stuff, mostly, of the "hey, I bet my reputation as a ball gown designer will make me madly marketable in the golf cleats market" variety. There's an awful lot of wearable stuff in that niche.
How do I love Century 21? Let me count the ways. I love that they have a children's department where kid's stuff, good kid's stuff, is cheaper than it is at KMart (I'm told). I love that they have a fully stocked fat chick department with a nice solid wall between it and the evening wear for emaciated people department. I love that I could find Timberland boots for the kid by sorting through a mountain of metallic pewter mules with four inch heels in a size that fits a four year old. (No, I didn't, in case you were wondering. Buy the mules, that is).
I love that they have tshirt-material sheet sets in four different colors and turkey platters with nauseous colored autumn leaves in relief strewn around them and crystal and linen napkins and brightly colored plastic phones and every men's designer known to western civilization and nightshirts with polar bears in stocking caps skating around on them.
I love that my daughter will occasionally try something on if I bribe her with something from their mountainous collection of vulgar children's accessories. I love that the most beautiful dress I've ever seen on a six year old was twenty dollars, with Isadora Duncan scarf, and that I found it on a rack with faux-leopard-trimmed stretch miniskirts and belly-freezer tops.
Sunday, we're shopping. I want to walk around and feel as if everything is normal and we could stop across the street at Borders for a reward if she tries on clothes without too much whining. I want the feeling, just for a few minutes, that there's something they didn't get. It's not much, but life's little victories don't have to be.
