Twenty-eighth Ordinary

Matthew 22: 11 – 12

Jesus continued, “When the king entered and looked over the scene, he spotted a man who wasn’t properly dressed. He said to him, ‘Friend, how dare you come in here looking like that!’ The man was speechless”.

I love to dress casually – maybe it was my years of wearing a Catholic school uniform. The polyester-blend jumper was too hot in the summer and too cold in the winter. I always had to wear something underneath – shorts in the summer so I could be active on the playground and pants in the winter for warmth – so the jumper was bunched up and ill-fitting. My shirt was stiff and starched, and my wool sweater scratchy and oppressive. Might as well have been a sackcloth and hairshirt – my 10-year-old self was convinced I was made to wear it for mortification of my flesh.

Fast-forward to university and I took my wardrobe in the opposite direction. Those were the ‘90s grunge years, when baggy jeans, flannel shirts, and sandals became my uniform. Thankfully, by the time I joined the work-a-day world, business casual was in, and I’ve never looked back to being buttoned-up.

With few places to go and be seen, the pandemic took dressing down to new levels. Tracksuit pants were my new normal. I was flipping through my cupboard the other day, though, and wistfully stopped on some clothes I’d worn to weddings and fancy parties. I’m keeping them; I want to be ready to celebrate when God sees us through the crisis, and I’ll be so grateful to God that I won’t notice my pinched feet or constricted waist once more.