Spiky Bugger
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Jan 5, 2014
- Messages
- 6,311
…and because in only seven months, I will have lived three-quarters of a century…riddle me this:
when I grew up, all if the clothing UNDER your clothes was called underwear. T-shirts, undershirts, shirts, bras, panties aka underpants, camisoles, slips, etc were your UNDERWEAR.
A couple of decades ago, the words “panties” and “underpants” fell into disuse. Suddenly, that item was called “underwear.” (Very confusing when you go for a chest x-ray and some 20-something tells you to “take off everything except your underwear.”) Today, in a discussion of feminine hygiene products with an 11-year-old, I attempted to describe a funny story* involving the “sanitary napkins” of the bygone era. The 11-year-old said, “Oh, you mean panty liners!”
So how come they aren’t called “underwear liners?”
*I was eleven, my sister was nine. Family friends were visiting. That mom and my mom had been friends since kindergarten. They, their husbands and daughters aged 16 and 14, and their brother (he and I were born two hours apart) and I were in the living room. My sister was missing.
Suddenly, my sister charged into the living room, one hand full of “sanitary napkins” and the other waving the package with the torture device called a “belt.” You see, back then the good folks at Kotex made a Beginner’s Kit for young girls and it was gift wrapped. I’d had that in my dresser drawer since Mom and I had had “the talk.” My rotten sister was snooping around in MY dresser drawers, saw the gift wrapped package, opened it and demanded immediate answers…in a room with two moms, two dads, two teen girls, their brother who was my age, and me.
I may remind her of this tomorrow.
when I grew up, all if the clothing UNDER your clothes was called underwear. T-shirts, undershirts, shirts, bras, panties aka underpants, camisoles, slips, etc were your UNDERWEAR.
A couple of decades ago, the words “panties” and “underpants” fell into disuse. Suddenly, that item was called “underwear.” (Very confusing when you go for a chest x-ray and some 20-something tells you to “take off everything except your underwear.”) Today, in a discussion of feminine hygiene products with an 11-year-old, I attempted to describe a funny story* involving the “sanitary napkins” of the bygone era. The 11-year-old said, “Oh, you mean panty liners!”
So how come they aren’t called “underwear liners?”
*I was eleven, my sister was nine. Family friends were visiting. That mom and my mom had been friends since kindergarten. They, their husbands and daughters aged 16 and 14, and their brother (he and I were born two hours apart) and I were in the living room. My sister was missing.
Suddenly, my sister charged into the living room, one hand full of “sanitary napkins” and the other waving the package with the torture device called a “belt.” You see, back then the good folks at Kotex made a Beginner’s Kit for young girls and it was gift wrapped. I’d had that in my dresser drawer since Mom and I had had “the talk.” My rotten sister was snooping around in MY dresser drawers, saw the gift wrapped package, opened it and demanded immediate answers…in a room with two moms, two dads, two teen girls, their brother who was my age, and me.
I may remind her of this tomorrow.
