Seduced by Velcro

by Cathy

It seems that we are constantly rushing through our tasks, doesn't it? We have so much to do, that we don't do things carefully enough. Things like making sure to triple-check your emails before you hit SEND and propel them into outer space where they can always be retrieved by someone at any given time. Scary, huh? Today I almost sent out a work email to a fashion designer in the industry. I meant to say, "I'm sure you'll go far" and at the very last minute, my eye caught it: I had written, "I'm sure you'll go fart."

If I can stop myself from laughing at my own carelessness long enough, I'd like to share with you another close call that would've been disastrous if not caught. It happened the other day in the midst of school-prepping morning madness. We were running late as we do every single morning, and my husband grabbed Bella's coat off the coat rack, where I had sleepily hung it the night before, freshly washed and dried and smelling like lavender-scented pine trees. He hurriedly tugged in onto her shoulders, she zipped it up and they were ready to go.

"Uhhh, mommy," said my husband slowly in his parenting voice, screeching the brakes on our Morning Rush Hour. "Aren't you going to need these?"

He turned Bella towards me and there she stood, oblivious to the look she would be sporting at school today. From two of the front velcro close tabs on her coat were hanging one Men's Jockey low-rise briefs and one of my black thongs. NO. JOKE. He quickly ripped them off and handed them to me while we all broke down in a belly laugh of belly laughs.

To make things worse, this wasn't the first time underwear decorated my kids' coats like a tricked-out Christmas tree. It happened the last time I washed their coats. That time, it was on Ari's bright, white coat, and from it was another one of MY thongs - this one in chartreuse green.  Thank Victoria's Secret, folks.

Here's what I don't get: why is it that only underwear - and only my husband's and my underwear - gets attracted to the velcro tabs?? Why couldn't it have been a sock or one of the girls' little undershirts or even a mitten? Those are all small enough to latch on. But why the parents' underwear? Why is that this velcro, which is soooo easily seduced, is determined to send my kids to school looking slutty-fied?

I'm not sure why, but hopefully, we will never be too rushed to realize that we are sending our kids off to school with Jockey briefs and thongs dangling from their coats. Hopefully...


P.S. A picture would've been worth a thousand laughs but alas, I forgot to take one. And plus, who wants to air their (at least it was clean) laundry out there? T.M.I., people.