Little Dress Lost: A new kind of fashion goodbye

You might have noticed I tend to wear beloved pants into the ground, and you might have read the mournful eulogy to my favorite shirt, but even on the sad occasions when I have to let go of a worn-out item of apparel, at least I get to say goodbye. It's completely different – a veritable tragedy – when a well-liked garment just up and disappears.

Such is the case of my pink party dress.

Now, losing track of my possessions is not an unfamiliar experience to me; socks, umbrellas, and gloves disappear with astounding regularity, but they are pretty small. I have never before misplaced a whole dress! I also sell my way through a lot of clothes, frequently after only one wear, and I never miss them—but I don't have any recollection of selling this dress. And I'm pretty sure I never wanted to, because that dress was fantastic—after the first use, I might have put it away for a few months to give it time to "breathe" and bring the novelty factor back up, but I wasn't ready to give it up for good! 

I even found a
picture of it!

This dress was a keeper. I really loved it. It was hot pink and gradated and pleated and spectacular. In fact, I liked it so much that after the first time I wore it, I bought another dress in almost the same style in blue. I considered wearing it for New Year's until a more formal dress landed in my closet, and I only seriously started thinking it about it once spring rolled around.

After I traded out my winter wardrobe last spring, I got to wondering where it was. I hadn't noticed it when I was making the switch. I went through my hanging bag of off-season and rarely worn clothing, but came up empty-handed.

I began to wonder if I had abandoned it by accident. The last time I remember seeing it was the last time I wore it. That was at a wedding in Baltimore last summer. When the party was over, we stayed the night in a hotel room. I remember lots of things about that weekend vividly—the floral arrangement I took home, the chocolates I stashed everywhere, my boyfriend's state of intoxication, what I ate for breakfast the next day—but I don't remember what I did with the dress. The next day, we had the valets store our belongings in the car while we biked around the city—but I don't think I would have stuffed the dress in a suitcase to get wrinkled, and I don't remember hanging it in the car. It is quite possible that I hung it up in the room and never thought of it again.

After suddenly remembering the dress a good 9 months after its disappearance, I wrote this story to help deal with my grief...and forgot about it again. Until this week, when I ran across the unfinished draft.

I still miss that dress. As evidenced by my frequent forgetting about it, I could probably let it go. But it's the principle of the thing! Never before have I lost a dress! I'll keep looking for it. One day, we will be together again. Even if I have to pay more than 13 dollars for a replacement!