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All day long, I went around with my shirt inside out. Nobody said a word. Maybe that was because it’s still the in-thing to sashay around “in fashion.”

I grew up back when the only labels on clothing were verbal – Sunday clothes, school clothes, play clothes, work clothes and hand-me-down clothes.

Back then, we all had a seamstress – either a mother, a grandmother or a little lady down the road who took in sewing to help make ends meet.

Mama would take me to Mabel Belcher’s store or to O.K. Ramage or The Star Store to look through the pattern books to find a pattern that would look nice in flour sack or biddy feed sack print.

If we were looking for something for a Sunday dress, I might get to pick out the cloth from the big bolts of material stacked on the shelf. If luck was on my side, I would be the first little girl to put my name on the pattern book. Then, when the new pattern book came in, I could get the old one and I’d have the grandest paper doll book any little girl could imagine.

When I had children of my own, I bought clothes that were practical and durable – blue jeans with reinforced knees and clothes and shoes they could grow into. Not one thought was given to the attached label, which often had a scissor cut through it.

Back then, if the label in your clothes was sticking out, some caring soul would, discretely, tuck it under for you so you wouldn’t be embarrassed.

No more of that.

But the puzzling thing was that no one noticed my shirt was inside out. Or, maybe, they didn’t care or thought it was funny.

My daughter once dressed herself to meet a visiting distant relative. At the time, “stretchy” belts were the fashion. She dolled up in dark flowing pants and a dark blouse and a wide, wide white stretchy belt. The female relative took great interest in her attire.

After studying her for a while, she asked, “Honey, when did you break your hip?”

High fashion was mistaken for a hip binding.

That was then, this was now.

So, I guess I doesn’t matter whether your label’s showing or you’re wearing your clothes inside out, somebody’s going to think you’re hip; somebody else will think it’s funny but most folks just plain don’t care .. or maybe they think you don’t!