[freya]

So, here's a little gay-son vs. straight-son clothes shopping story.

When they were both home at the same time last (in July), they both wanted to shop for clothes. We decided to go to the mall. We go into one of those junior clothing boutique stores like American Eagle, Gap, Banana Republic, etc.... Straight son walks in the front door, through the store toward the dressing room, stopping only very briefly to grab anything that he thinks might be what he wants. He's in the dressing room and trying stuff on in 3 minutes, max. Meanwhile, gay son is carefully perusing every rack, carefully scrutinizing several items before he even has one that he might want to try on. By the time gay-son is about half way through the store, straight son has already tried on several items, coming out, briefly glancing at each one in the mirror, and announcing decisively of any item even half-way fits and looks even half-way OK on him: "Yeah, I look good!"

By the 15 minute mark, when straight-son has selected the items he's going to purchase and is heading for the check-out, gay son is, maybe, ready to go to the fitting room.

Mom and straight son stand and watch as he tries things on, comes out of the fitting room, stands in front on the mirror turning every which way at least 3 times and carefully critiques the item he's considering: "Is there something wrong with the dye here?," "Isn't this stitching unusual?", "Is this too much that other black shirt I have?", "Is this color right on me?', "Does this make me look fat?" Straight son counters every question with something like: "Dude, it's a friggin' T-shirt!", "Man, it's a pair of jeans, who's gonna care?", "They're too tight, dude, you don't want people lookin' at your skinny *ss!" (little does he know!!!), and/or "You're gonna pay $50 for that?????".

Finally, at like the 45 minute mark, we are ready to go -- straight son to go home and gay son to go to the next store.

Eventually, we exit the mall through JC Penney's where mom notices that all of the swimsuits are 50% off and offers to buy them each one. So they start looking at swimsuits and teasing each other about their respective tastes. Finally, about 10 minutes after straight son has made his selection, gay son holds one up and says with great appreciation: "This is different!" Straight son stares at it in disbelief, so incredulous that he says, without thinking about what he's saying: "Dude, you wear that and you're gonna look a little q*eer!" Gay son pulls himself up as tall as he can, begins waving the suit around with one hand while he plants his other hand firmly on his hip, and pronounces loudly in his most sarcastic, mock-offended, queeny voice: "I beg your pardon! I look 100% q*eer 100% of the time!"

We all burst out laughing and straight son conceeds the point with: "Touche, man!"

freya