I once turned into Batgirl, and no one noticed. My mother-in-law had sent me a check for my birthday, and I decided to trot into Loehmann’s to see what might tickle my fancy. I had low expectations, because I have found, in recent years, that Loehmann’s clothes generally run in smaller sizes. The pants, which are low cut, and the tops, which are cut high, don’t often meet in the middle, and my middle is not cut out for exposure.
Loehmann’s in Chevy Chase is nothing like the Brooklyn Loehmann’s of my youth. I hated that store. My mother would schlep me there on the B41 bus up Flatbush Avenue for an afternoon of hideously boring rack roaming. When you walked in the first thing you see were the octogenarian husbands all sitting in a row of hard-backed chairs in the front window. I was not yet swept up in the magic of clothing, or the thrill of a good buy, or the transformation that occurs when you discover and try on the perfect outfit.
I was equally horrified by the communal dressing room. All those jiggly, ugly bodies, smooshing themselves into skirts that were too tights, blouses with too much cleavage. It was a global smorgasboard. Russian ladies from Brighton Beach bursting out of slinky prom-like outfits. Italian girls from Bensonhurst oiling themselves to fit into disco pants. Carribean women from my neighborhood, Prospect Lefferts Gardens, with huge afros, trying on wildly colored, dashiki-like dresses. Jewish girls from Flatbush looking to pass and hide behind Fair Isle sweaters. And then there was my mother, whose penchant for purple made her trying-on excursions a mortifying exercise in eclecticism. Even though my own 12-year-old body was nothing like those around me, I was too insecure and uncomfortable in my own skin to even contemplate getting undressed in front of other people and besides, there were no Faded Glory jeans in those days at Loehmann’s, and therefore nothing that called to me.
I have come a long way from the Brooklyn Loehmann’s, and today I find shopping delightful, snagging a bargain exhilarating and Loehmann’s has long been my temple to both. When I walked in with my birthday money in hand, I looked to my left and spied it almost immediately, hanging on the wall. The jacket. It was black patent leather, and it was cut short and cute. I raced over to the jacket, with my cutthroat killer instinct on high alert, circling my body around it to make sure no one else saw it as I stalked it. It was my size. I took it off the hanger and tried it on over my clothes. It had a belt. I never wear belts because they make my middle look pudgy, but this belt made me look slender and cool. Like a girl detective. Or better yet, like Batgirl.
I have always wanted to be Batgirl. I adored the kitschy old Batman show on television. My friend Kenny and I would play Batman and Robin, and while sometimes I got to be Catwoman, I didn’t really like the choices. When I played Robin, I had to be a boy, and when I was Catwoman, I was the villain. But when the second season came around and they introduced Commissioner Gordon’s librarian daughter, played by the lovely Yvonne Craig, who had perfect cheekbones and a perfect 60s style wrap bun on top of her head, along with a Jackie Kennedy coat, I knew something was up.
When Commissioner Gordon’s red Batphone rang, and Barbara made an excuse to run home, I was on the edge of my seat. She raced to her groovy single girl’s apartment and sat at her vanity. Then she pushed a button and the wall with the vanity turned around and lo and behold, there was a changing table for Batgirl! Suddenly she was in a skin-tight, purple patent leather catsuit, with a cool utility belt, and high heel boots. Her eyes were punctuated by a large amount of Maybelline eyeliner and she wore a cat mask and a beautiful Titian colored wig with the perfect amount of bounce at the bottom of her flip. There was a matching cape. She was stunning. I already worshipped her. She pushed a button on her wall and a large blue metal grate on her wall swirled open to reveal her Batgirl motorcycle. (How come no one who lived in her apartment building ever saw it?) She hopped on and raced out to meet Batman and Robin to help them trounce whatever bad guys were on tap that day – I no longer remember if it was the Joker or Mr. Freeze or the Riddler. All I remember is that there was to be no more Robin or Catwoman for me – from now on, I was Batgirl. It was a defining moment.
I long ago lost my ability to wear a catsuit, but when I saw the patent leather jacket, I knew I had to own it. It makes me feel strong, beautiful and sexy. It reminds me of how much I had to look forward to when I was six and all I wanted to do was catch the bad guys and sit astride my motorcycle, side-by-side with the Caped Crusaders, making sure the world was a better and safer place for the residents of Gotham City. (I also liked being captured and tied to a conveyor belt headed directly for a giant saw-toothed blade that was going to slice me into a thousand bits and then being rescued by Batman and escaping at the last second – who wouldn’t?)
The day I wore the jacket to work, not one person looked twice at me. No one winked, no one got the joke, no one on the Metro yelled “Hey Batgirl!” There were no bad guys waiting around the corner for me to catch. I was crushed. How could they not see? How could they not understand that girlhood dreams can reemerge, reformulate and create transformation -- all in the shape of a black patent leather jacket? All I knew was that I was Batgirl, and that since I first encountered her, the intervening years have groomed me to take on the villainry of a more global Gotham with the same strength, glamour and chutzpah that she first displayed forty years ago when she broke into the ranks of the boys-only club and kicked her high heeled boots with a “BANG’ and a “TWHACK” that rivaled any other caped crusader on TV.
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