I See London, I See France

Glory asks about the touchy moment when we are treated to a view of a colleague’s panties through a light colored pair of trousers.

After PeaceBang is able to take her hand away from her mouth in horror, she will respond to this question.

I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.

:::one hour later:::

Okay, I’m back.

People of the cloth, it is imperative that we speak the truth in love to one another about our fashion faux pas. The evident panty line or visible posterior of one brother or sister in the ministry is a blushing embarrassment for all of us. There are already too many buffoon clergy characters in our literary and cultural history — we can’t afford any more in our own day and time.

When you see an egregious violation of sartorial appropriateness, you must speak up. Say something like, “Your words were really inspiring, but I’m sure you never intended to upstage yourself by treating us all to a view of your skivvies.”

Or, “I wonder if any of the congregation were able to attend properly to your sermon after having seen the whole of your bazoom when you leaned over to tell the children’s story. I’m sure you had no idea, but my dear, lean forward right now and let me show right here in the powder room mirror.”

Or, “My dear and reverend sir, I commend you for showing up to build the Habitat house. However, let me recommend to you that before you leave the house for such good Christian endeavors, that you squat in your pants to check the fit. Having hammered shingles below you for an hour, I feel especially qualified to give you this advice.”

Use humor, but be direct. Speak your piece and then beat a hasty retreat with a kind handclasp or encouraging hand on the shoulder. When appropriate, make recommendations. I would be so grateful if colleagues would help one another in this wise instead of remaining silently horrified. I live in constant fear that my clothes are pulling in the back or the front in ways that I can’t see, and making me look like a sausage wrapped in casing (because I think overly large, formless clothes are the ugliest possible way to deal with a plump figure). I would so appreciate it if someone took me aside and said, “Love the blazer, PeaceBang, but there’s a bit of an unfortunate tailoring here at the back that I know you can’t see.”

I mean, heavens… even with the constricting undergarments, the primping, the clothes, the make-up and the hair products, we’re all still subject to fashion mistakes.

Also see #6 On The Booger Patrol here :
http://beautytipsforministers.blogspot.com/2006/04/make-up-tips-part-i.html#links

5 Replies to “I See London, I See France”

  1. Or how about a glimpse of the elastic waistband of a colleague’s undies peeking over her slacks/jeans? What to do? And how do we prevent it?

  2. Here’s a dilemma I’ve got–of a similar vein. A minister I know in her early 60s draws in the outer halves of her eyebrows every morning. That’s not a problem in itself, because she’s lost the eyebrow hair that was once there (probably due to plucking over the years.) However, she paints the line over and above her natural eyebrow line, and I think she would look a lot better if she a) didn’t paint on the extra brow (I saw her swimming once and she looked fine without the paint) or b) painted her brow line in the natural place. I’m fairly close with her yet I still feel very awkward addressing this issue with her and have avoided it thus far. Any tips?

  3. Two things. One, you could say to her, “I was climbing out of the pool today and I ran into So-and-So. I was so embarrassed because, of course, I looked like bloody hell! I envy you for looking so great when you climb out of the pool. When So-and-So caught me, I thought to myself, ‘well, we can’t all look as together as (colleague in question) does.”
    Then if she takes the bait, say something like, “You know what? Don’t clock me for saying this, but you looked so pretty that morning and I noticed something different. It was your eyebrows. Your natural brow line is really nice. It makes you look younger.”

    Hopefully she’ll respond in some way (that isn’t clocking you) and you can then confide in some beauty trick you’ve tried in the past that you’re not sure works very well, like padding your bra or something.

    It’s all about sharing and caring.

  4. Thanks, PB! Good advice. Now, all I have to do is get her in the pool again. Hmmmm… That could be a challenge… But it surely avoids the awkwardness of other approaches.

  5. I thought of this post today. Hubby and I attended an Episcopal church this morning and one of the servers. . . Um, well, we could clearly read her “Washington Nationals” t-shirt under her alb.

    There was a game today — lots of evidence from game ware on the Metro — but please: the jeans and sneakers seen at the lower hem were bad enough.

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