Connie O'Reyes

I work downtown. It’s nice in the sense that I get to walk past large buildings and 4 coffee franchises in my short walk from the train to the office, but it can be hectic. Sometimes my sole goal in the morning is to make it to work without any fiascos. Yes, fiascos. It’s the perfect word to describe the non-exciting yet always traumatic events that happen between 8am and 9amish. To illustrate the stress involved in getting myself to work, I have a scene from a Disney movie that can explain it better than I ever could..

Between my short distanced-long timed commute, something always seems to go horribly, horribly wrong. And today, it was my tights.

Attempting to cut down the time it takes me to get out the door, I sometimes attempt to plan out my outfit for the next day ahead of time to avoid any outbreaks of, “Am I too old/fat/crazy to wear this shirt on a Monday with these pants if its 51 degrees out?” routine. Today it was the collared pattern sleeveless dress with a slip, or, in other words, my latest purchase from Target.

I put my haute couture on this morning and it was noticeably shrunk. And I don’t mean the, “Do I look fat in this and if you answer with anything other than, ‘but of course not’ I’ll cry worse than that time I got bangs” way, but in a matter of fact, it got shorter in length my body image is just fine sort of shrunk. Basically, the hemline was shown above the knee, which, in today’s society is perfectly natural, but in work world (and in my cray cray mind) it screams Madame who lives above a saloon in the Wild West blurting, “Come and get it, boys!” (In reality, it was about an inch or two above the knee.) I gave my inner Catholic school girl self a demerit and headed out the door.

Tights, slip, dress, shoes. I was headed for my long walk to the train. Conscious of my “come hither” ensemble, I kept looking behind me to be sure there were no looky lous or pervy petes checking out my derriere. What people behind me probably thought though was, “Oh that poor crazy girl thinks people are following he-WOW, would you look at those saggy tights? She looks simply atrocious.” People can be so mean.

Walking briskly, I noticed my tights were taking a quick turn south. Being the lady that I am, I nonchalantly chose to hike them up at opportune moments in my walk to avoid any bystanders witness my actions that mimicked a kindergartener at graduation pulling up her skirt over her head to readjust her discomfort from her new hosiery. 5 pulls and three tugs later, we were at the train.

Having the luck of living too far away from downtown proper, I was able to grab a seat and readjust in a way that I thought was rather discreet, but in actuality everyone on the train probably thought I had fleas. Foolish that I was, I thought this was the end of my discomfort.

Heading out the CTA car, I could already feel the elastic slip from my waist. Having to exit at the longest-distanced stop ever in existence, I scuttled along toward the set of subway stairs. Aware of my predicament, I opted for the escalator and planted my backside along the rail, hoping to God none of my coworkers were below, glancing up at my vision.

By the time I reached the surface, my tights were no higher than a centimeter above my hemline. I was one good gust of wind away from being arrested for ridiculousness. With nowhere to turn, I sprinted toward the nearest open restaurant and high tailed it up toward the golden arches of the ickiest public restroom to hike up my tights higher than ever humanly possible.

To any male readers, the feeling of hoisting up a pair of baggy tights in an icky downtown restaurant can only be compared to eating a cheeseburger topped with the last slice of bacon ever while watching your team win the Super Bowl. In other words, it’s great.

Once at work, I was fine. Being in close proximity to a restroom makes it easier to avoid any tights falling down incidents, but just to be sure I stayed in my office as often as possible.

And THAT my friends is why I was late to practice!