There is this weird out-of-place feeling you get as an unmarried guy when you are with your girlfriend at women’s fashion stores, you young-looking, naive and a hot target for being judged as insensitive. It becomes very hard not to give a fuck, that muscle of mine not being exercised much of late.

Here I am standing in the middle of these very narrow aisles where all the action takes place. The clothes hang on hangers and are arranged over a rotating fixture. Here is my girlfriend picking out the interesting ones and me helping her out on the occasions when I am swimming right with my nose above the pool of shyness and embarrassment I am drowning in. There are hundreds of these other women who want to move around this same cramped up space and of all things they pick me up as the rascal blocking that amazing dress by my torso or deadlocking the entire chain of mobility by just being there.

Let me talk about dressing rooms and the matters surrounding them: I can’t stand them. I seriously cannot. I do wish I learn for the sake of my girlfriend and there is nothing to do but learn but meanwhile, I cannot stand them. This is the most embarrassing zones of all especially when the store is crowded. Let me give you some reasons:

1. There are usually other ladies waiting for a turn to one of the dressing rooms along with your girlfriend. As anyone who has been to one of these stores can attest, the spaces around these rooms are heavily cramped and usually lacking in foot-space. Other women see me as an aberration blocking their way to the line or watch me like I am voyeur spying on them and their clothing habits. I have a suggestion for the person designing these stores: make the area around dressing rooms BLOODY MORE SPACIOUS please! Yesterday, while standing just besides the line for the dressing room of a women’s apparel store waiting for my girlfriend, a middle-aged lady sneaks up on me and asks sarcastically, “Are you in the line?”.

2. The employees roaming around, who are usually women, are convinced you are a possible deviant and seem adamant on proving themselves right by watching every twitch you have as you stand there as possible evidence towards the same.

3. Your girlfriend selects a dress and walks outside to show you the fitting for a second opinion. She stands right at the head of the Medusa-queue and expects you to answer how the dress looks. The entire audience of ladies is there, waiting in the line with nothing to do except poke their noses in other people’s matters and they all turn around and start staring at you with their Medusa-like gazes to see what judgement you are going to pass on the dress your girlfriend is wearing. You cannot express how pretty she looks. She thinks the dress is okayish and even your initial reaction to it was not as good. She does not buy it.

No gender studies here, I believe all of this is a simple store design problem. A store catering exclusively towards women’s apparel is not designed with the simple scenario in mind that guys might come accompany their female partners or mom or his sister’s friends at the store. Otherwise, why would someone place the entire honeymoon lingerie section right near the fitting rooms? Not that there is anything wrong with standing beside hanging lingerie but just the presence of a guy there seems to make store female employees and female customers more conscious, to say the least.

Although not giving a fuck what others think might alleviate my pain to a greater degree I realize.

See you tomorrow,
Avi.