How I Lost My Underwear

Did I ever tell you about the time my underwear fell off while I was walking home from school? I remember it so well every year at this time, like an anniversary that resurrects all the vividness of the day: a slight chill in the air, the falling leaves, my pounding heart and panic at the thought of my underwear falling off in public.

I was only in the eighth grade in 1965-66 and we were required to wear skirts or dresses to school. Pants would not be allowed in our public school until my senior year in 1969-1970. If I was wearing pants that day, my underwear wouldn’t have fallen down and there wouldn’t be a story to tell.

I didn’t know I had a problem until I started walking home that October afternoon. About five minutes into the walk, I felt a very subtle, but definite ping at my waist. Had the elastic on my underwear just snapped? I wasn’t quite sure, but they definitely felt looser. Within seconds I knew, with every step I took, the underwear were falling ever so slightly to the rhythm of my walk. I slowed my steps and pressed my books to my stomach to hold them up in place around my bellybutton, but I had a real problem because I had no way to hold up the back piece of flapping cotton which was sliding down my rear. I couldn’t get a good grip through my jacket and I could feel them inching further and further down my hips.

I was walking on the main street leading out from school. It was a busy road with buses and cars packed with seniors leaving for the day. All I wanted today was to find a tree that I could duck behind to shimmy my panties up. Some boys were walking a few feet behind me; I could hear their conversation getting louder as they approached. The undies were falling steadily with every step I took and were already about halfway down my ass. I had to do something to stop their downward slide so I spread my legs wide and did a sort of hoola-hoop shimmy followed by a duck-waddle step. The guys behind me burst out laughing like two hyenas and continued to turn their heads to watch my hoola-hoop-waddle as they passed me by.

My face was burning hot; I could feel my heart pounding under my coat. I stood still in place for a moment, legs spread wide to hold up the drooping drawers, until the two guys were out of sight. I stood firmly in that stance and twisted my torso around to scan in front and behind me. I was in luck, at last, with no traffic and no other walkers in sight, I had a window of opportunity that would only last a few seconds. I reached inside my coat and grabbed the outside of my skirt at the top of my thigh where the underwear had been stopped by my quick thinking spread eagle stance. I felt the tip of the underwear and yanked it high. The other side of the undies fell loose and dangled free down my other thigh. My skirt hem was uneven, at this point, with one side hanging down to my knees and the other side halfway up my thigh, but I didn’t care; I wasn’t letting go of that elastic.

Thinking back today, I don’t know why I didn’t just let the darn things fall right there on the sidewalk and continue walking without looking back. I guess panic got the better of my common sense because all I could think about was the gas station on the corner. If I could just make it to the gas station and get into the ladies’ room, perhaps I could tie the underwear up in a knot somehow, just to get me home. Then I would ask my mother to sew them up and put on a new piece of elastic. What logic is this? I can’t even answer that today, but at thirteen years old, the thought of walking home with no underwear on was horrifying.

I was taking my time, taking no chances, walking in tiny baby steps like a Chinese woman with bound feet. I couldn’t risk walking faster and losing my tenuous grip on the minuscule piece of elastic that was already stretching and slipping out of my sweaty fingers. By the grace of God I made it to the gas station, grabbed the ladies’ room key off the wall, and waddled into the grungy bathroom.

Without thinking, I pushed the door shut with both hands, and felt something whoosh down my legs. I looked down to see my underwear nestled between my shoes. I couldn’t move for a few minutes. I just stared down at that formless cotton heap on the dirty bathroom floor and started crying and laughing at the same time. I picked them up with two fingers and threw them in the garbage pail. And that was that. I continued my walk home from school with my jacket open and the cool breeze blowing up my skirt.

I never told my mother what happened until many, many years later. Why? Who knows. It was such a frightening experience, it took me years to find the humor in the whole incident. And then it just popped up in a conversation one day about the high price of underwear. I briefly commented that, “I had better buy some new underwear before they fall off – again.” Now, I recount the story fondly just to think that, at one point in my life, I was slim enough that my underwear could actually fall down with no encumbrance.