Too Many Clothes

First World Problems

Longtime readers (this Substack has a blog predecessor going back to 2008) are aware that I am a man of ritual, that my life is guided along by recurring events and commitments that give it structure. There are wags out there who refer to this as “rigidity”, but what do they know? My rituals include Saturday morning errands, monthly massages, UVA sports (several apply), Sunday lamb, and of course, the twice yearly “swapping of the clothes”.

When I was in the Navy and encouraged to move every two years or so, the swapping of the clothes was entirely unnecessary, as I used each move to strategically minimize. And by that, I mean everything. I got rid of furniture, books, art, and clothes. Move-ins at whatever new accommodation I had secured took at most half a day. I liked it like that. Kind of a ritual.

When I cast my lot with Catherine some 16 years ago, I lost the simplifying beauty of those moves, and my life since then has been one of accumulation. Added to this late-stage hoarding is the fact that we live in a house built in 1966 on a plan that was some 200 years old—and apparently, Maryland colonials were not all that particular about closet space. And so, I must swap much of my wardrobe twice a year.

The trick each year is not to get sucker-punched by Mother Nature presenting either an early frost or an early Spring. I think I timed things generally well this year. This logistics exercise involves first going into the closet and taking a hard look at what is there with an eye to a Goodwill run. This is always the least successful part of the ritual, as while I am in real life a fairly decisive person, in this instance, I tend to overestimate my affection for certain garments. For instance, at the height of “Ted Lasso” mania, I purchased a “Roy Kent” AFC Richmond jersey. Don’t ask me why. I have worn it exactly once in public, and I am not sure it will ever be worn again. But for some odd reason, it did not make it onto the “Goodwill Pile”. Instead, it went into the “put away for next year” pile.

Part two involves coming out here to the ManCave where I have stacked big bins in the corner containing whatever out of season clothing that needs storing. There are four such large bins which I then carry one at a time through the house to where my closet is, being careful not to leave any door open that might grant one of our house-pets a ticket to freedom. I arrived at the practice of storing these bins here after several years of negotiating one of those hideaway ladders into our attic where my clothes were previously stored. Seeing the future and my bleed-out death in falling down the hideaway ladder, I decided on this safer option.

One by one, the bins are slogged over to the house, and opened to reveal their (in some cases) ancient treasures. I throw cedar balls in with the clothes, so there’s a nice smell then I open the bins, and what looks back at me are whatever elements of my wardrobe that are to take me through the next six months. But there is one other serious complication in this mix that I haven’t revealed. I have essentially three different wardrobes. One for Fat Bryan, one for Medium Bryan (the man writing this essay) and one for Skinny Bryan. Which means when you multiply those Bryans by the twice yearly swap, I have six wardrobes.

A small portion of the celebratory binge after the 2019 Hoops Natty

When I have completed the swap (which I will tomorrow—Sunday), the “out” season’s clothes must be binned and carried back out to the ManCave. Now—I hear some of you clucking along with “First World problems you got there, McGrath” and you would be right. I LONG for a situation where my available clothes storage was sufficient to my storage needs, but in order for this to occur either my available storage must dramatically increase, or I must part with several of the 13 pairs of khakis I’ve accumulated, a few of the dozen or so bulky wool sweaters I own, or maybe half of the probably fifty t-shirts I have (including several mid-80’s UVA Sigma Chi Derby Days gems and probably fifteen UVA Basketball Natty shirts), the latter of which demands a disciplined decision-making that for some reason eludes me. I’ll let you know how things go next April

Dinner with Friends

Forty years ago last month the greatest four consecutive years of my life began when I started college at the University of Virginia. Don’t get me wrong—I’ve had PLENTY of amazing years since then, but those four in a row…my oh my. I get that it sounds sad for a man nearing sixty to talk about his late teens and early 20’s with such reverie, but that’s why you pay the big bucks for this Substack.

That fall, along with all of the other wonders to which I was exposed (chicken sandwiches at The Castle, flowing kegs on Rugby Road, boarding school graduate First Year Women, etc.) I got to know a dude on Metcalf first right named John. I lived on Metcalf first left. I got to know John because he and I were Navy ROTC guys, and so we had to get to school a week before everyone else so that we could learn to march and wear uniforms and salute. John had a goofy laugh and a million dollar smile and the ladies found him irresistible. So did I, and we became friends very quickly. Friendship with John led to friendship with Tom, a guy that John had made friends with who then I befriended. Tom came to UVA with his best friend from home (Rob) and so Rob also became my friend.

Tom and Rob and John are my best friends in the world to this day. Tom and Rob live near Richmond and so the three of us are season ticket holders for UVA football (which will not be discussed further here). John is an airline pilot and lives in Florida, so we see less of him though he is part of the group texts (where we talk about how bad UVA football is, but I’m not gonna talk about that). They are a treasure.

The Boys—circa 2018

I’m driving to Richmond later today (Saturday 10/14) to meet up with Tom and Rob for a steak dinner. I organized this because I have not seen them at UVA football games, as I have had things other than watching bad football (but we’re not gonna talk about that) on my schedule like trimming my cat’s nails. My apologies to John if he’s reading this—I didn’t loop you into this but I probably should have, as you are an airline pilot and all and can summon jets at your will. As I write this I am flooded with memories of these giants, these Titans among men, and the times we had in Charlottesville and since. I’ve already informed them that those who survive me are obligated to sing “The Good Old Song” at my funeral.

John got a fifth year a UVA as he was an Aero Engineer and with the things he had to do with ROTC he was entitled to stay another, but on the Monday after Rob, Tom, and I graduated, we (plus John) played a round of golf at Birdwood. The next day, I packed my car (bitchin’ 1985 Firebird) and drove to Norfolk to join my first ship and start my life as an adult. But on that Monday before real life began, the three best friends I had in the world and I stood together at one of the tees chatting as easily as it had always been. All of a sudden—and I remember this today like it was happening in real time—a great melancholy came over me. I said, “Boys, it’s never gonna be like this again.” And I was right.

Doesn’t mean we can’t keep trying.

Hunting Season

When I became a tenant at Miss Catherine’s Boarding House and bought into the Eastern Shore country farmer life, I was not a hunter. I had nothing against hunting mind you, it just had never risen on my to-do list to the point where it displaced sleeping in or being warm. I was not ready for how pervasive hunting is here on the the Shore, but I quickly became aware. Perhaps the crowning event in my exposure was the precipitous drop-off in progress suffered by our massive home renovation 12 years ago once hunting season came around. But I digress.

I bought me a shotgun (Benelli M2 American) several years ago and have done some deer hunting (though not on our land—Catherine says “they live here”) and a bit of goose hunting (they are deemed to be “in transit”). I have some friends with proper goose blinds, well-constructed and strategically placed. I have an expeditionary version of a blind (pictured below) that I put away at the end of the season in a shed/barn nestled among the giant magnolia between our house and one of the fields.

Scene from inside my blind on a cold morning past

The shed/barn also holds my decoys which—like my clothes—there are too many of. Yesterday (Friday) was the day set aside for making my way over to the shed/barn which in the months since I had last visited it had become overgrown with vines and the like, to extricate my blind and the decoys for inspection and inventory. One must be careful in the opening of barn/sheds after a good bit of inactivity, as there is no telling what manner of varmint may have sought refuge there. For a while, the doors weren’t closing properly, and so there were some mice and rats wintering over there. But we had the doors fixed and there was a proper seal and little evidence of intrusion.

After getting the gear all together, I headed to the ManCave for the (ritual) of obtaining my Maryland Hunting License for the season. This is a pretty straightforward, web-based process that makes me legal for another year. The next ritual is however, not nearly as pleasurable, as it is my annual attempt to crack the code on the Maryland DNR Hunting Season Schedule. World War II cryptographers were confronted with lesser challenges, but I think I have been able to discern when I will be able to hunt the the things I want to hunt (this year deer, geese, turkeys). I added these dates to my schedule and sat for a bit thinking about the cold walk to the blind with my gun and my coffee and the task of placing the decoys and the sound of my boots on the morning frost and it made me very, very happy.