Valentine’s Day is less than two weeks away, which means we are in prime lingerie-gifting season. I am a sucker for things that are pretty, luxurious, dramatic, and feature tiny finicky details of fanciness, so lingerie should theoretically be right up my alley. I do love the idea of lingerie, and often I buy the stuff when I am feeling particularly flush and having fantasies about being a fancy lady whose bra and underwear match. Just a day ago, I found a great sale online and started tossing beautiful lacy push-up bras into my shopping cart with wild abandon, but before I finished the order, I saw a Facebook post from a friend of mine asking: “What do you really think of lingerie?”
I paused for a moment with my mouse hovering over the “buy” button and thought, “What do I really think of lingerie?”
“Do you wear it?” my friend had asked. And when I thought about it, I had to admit that I do not.
I love the idea of lingerie. I love the lace and the tiny stitches and bows. I love the idea of being the kind of person who is secretly wearing excruciatingly beautiful lingerie under her comfy sweaters and business suits. Those people seem very interesting to me. But while I own several sets of very, very nice lingerie picked up from La Perla and Agent Provocateur sample sales, I realized I never, ever wear them. They’re not as comfortable as the random T-shirt bras and stretchy thongs I wear every day and don’t care about. The lace shows through my clothes and makes my shirts look weird. And they’re too expensive and delicate to wear, and not worry about stretching or tearing them or wearing them out. Whenever I do wear them, I feel like I’m walking around wearing clothes made out of paper that I am trying very hard not to wrinkle or tear, which is why when I looked in my drawers, I found several sets of lovely lace, vintage-style lingerie with the tags still on. Meanwhile, my beige convertible T-shirt bra has been worn so often the elastic is shredding right out of the bottom of it. I’d replace it, but there’s nothing more comfortable than a bra just before it completely falls apart.
I still love the idea of lingerie, but when I realized all my nice bras still have the tags on them, I had to leave my Gilt cart with all the lingerie still in it. (If you want it, a great sale is going on over there with lots of pretty lingerie by Dita Von Teese at half off.) I’m just not a lingerie woman. I wish I were, but I’m not.
What about you? What do you think of lingerie? Do you actually wear it? Do you think it’s sexy? Do your partners think it’s sexy or unsexy? (One friend asserts that no guy under 40 thinks lingerie is sexy.) Do you care what those partners think?
