Undie Pressure

Every mother has to draw a line somewhere. For me, it’s drawn at sewing costumes for the ballet concert. Oh, don’t get me wrong: I’m happy to bake for the kindergarten stall and dress up for the School Bush Dance and even refrain from telling fart jokes to the Principal. But when it comes to becoming a one-woman sweat-shop chucking an all-nighter to hand-sew sequins on bow-ties? The. Line. Is. Drawn. 

Of course, the fact that I can’t sew for shit is neither here nor there. 

Anyway, for this year’s concert, I outsourced all sewing to my own mother with the thought that the worst of it had been dealt with. Now, I’d just have to show up on the night of the concert, sit back and enjoy the show, right?

Wrong.

Last week, I received a list of “costume extras” in the dance school newsletter that has made me think of those “Scavenger Hunts” I used to go on at university. Except I have to provide my own alcohol. The hardest item on the list to find, it turns out, is the “flesh-coloured underpants”. For a five year old. Because so many five year olds wear sheer clothing.   

“Oh, NDM,” I can hear certain people say. “You can buy flesh-coloured underwear for pre-tweens at any specialty dance shop.”

Sure! As long as you don’t live in an area where the closest thing to a “specialty shop” is a Kebab House where you can choose between three different kinds of sauce on your lamb doner. Get a grip, people!

In any case, someone told me I could buy them at Target. But when I went there on a mercy dash the morning of the first dress rehersal with Tiddles McGee in tow, I couldn’t find anything remotely”flesh-coloured”, except, perhaps, if I were paint my daughter hot pink.

After several agonising minutes, I settled on a shade of pink that might pass for “slightly sunburnt” or “blushing with rage” in a darkened room and Tiddles and I ran to the checkout (as fast as you can when you have to negotiate five aisles of toys in your path). And of course, because I was in such a hurry, the pair I’d selected was without that all important price-tag so a call had to be made to “Sonya” in Children’s Wear for a price check.  

Tiddles and I stood and waited. And waited. And then waited some more.

Then Tiddles McGee started tugging at the front of his shorts and in one of those cold flashes of memory, I realised I’d put him in underpants that morning, as part of me paying lipservice to the toilet training process now that he is three. 

“Hang on, Tiddles,” I told him as we waited. And waited. 

Finally it emerges that “Sonya” is not rostered on today and another call for a price check is made, this time to “Rayleen” in Children’s Wear. After a few more minutes of waiting (me) and tugging (Tiddles), “Rayleen” turned up… to take the underpants I wanted to buy all the way back to Children’s Wear to find the price. It was by this point I suspected it might have been quicker for me to have filled in a Target job application form, gotten interviewed and hired, done the price check myself and then handed in my resignation. Sheesh!

In the meantime, Tiddles was growing incredibly uncomfortable. “I think he’s about to blow!” I remarked to the checkout lady, wondering if I should ask her to call in a mop-up team as a pre-emptive measure. 

“You know, we do have toilets in the store, “ the lady replied. “They’re in the far corner of the store, just next to Children’s Wear.”

At which point, I was almost tempted to piss on the floor myself in utter rage, except that “Rayleen” turned up and I was finally able to pay for the underpants and, scooping up Tiddles McGee, run to the nearest toilets that weren’t the ones next to Children’s Wear, which would have just made me feel like a dog returning to its own vomit.

Luckily, Tiddles made it. Not so for the underpants I’d purchased, which were deemed by the Powers That Be to be “too pink”. And two days later, I ended up driving three suburbs away to a specialty shop where I paid a small fortune for a pair of knickers my daughter will probably only wear once while dancing to the beat of her own internal drum at the back of a crowded stage.

Now all I need is for someone to ask me to stay up the night before the concert hand-sewing sequins on said underpants and my happiness will be complete.