Where the f*** are the pockets on women's clothing?

E&B break down the quest for pocket equality.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hey, this is Bridget and you're listening to stuff Mom
never told you. Now today, I have a little bit
of a personal gripe, but this episode is based on,
which is that I bought what I thought was a beautiful,

(00:27):
beautiful skirt. I couldn't wait to try it on. It
was pretty expensive, more money than I usually drop on
an outfit I get at home, and it has those
damn decorative pockets, but aren't even really real pockets where
they like the ones that are so shut. They're just
like not even they give you a little dip and
it's not you can't put anything in there, So they're
just for fashion. They're just decorative, decorative pockets, decorative pocket

(00:49):
because god forbid I have anything to carry a phone on,
a pencil or whatever. And it got me thinking, where
are the are the pockets on women's clothing? What is
going on? Where do they? Where did we go? And
on the other side, I'm the kind of person who
if I'm in the fitting room trying an address, especially
formal addresses, I found this in more formal gowns especially,

(01:13):
and I'm on the fence about it looks good fits,
good fabrics, cool, Okay, I kind of like it, and
then I realized as my hands go down the sort
of waste of the gown itself. Oh my god, there
are pockets in this dress. Instantly sold. Pockets are such
a game changer. There's a total apparel game changer decision making,

(01:36):
like absolutely going from the maybe category to the hell yeah,
I'm bringing that home category. I don't feel like we're
exaggerating the extreme pleasure that pockets on garments, real pockets,
functional pockets give us. And we're backpack love and women.
I mean, it's not like we're without a good satchel
on occasion. I'm not really a purse totor as much

(01:57):
anymore since I discovered the love of a good formal backpack,
which you you that I was a little plug for.
If you are a sporty gal, get yourself a apolished backpack,
a work backpack and love. So, first of all, I
get it. Yes, this is totally totally a first world problem.
You might be thinking, you know, bridget of all the

(02:20):
things going on in the world right now, pockets really,
but listen to this. Fashion is actually political, right, Like
most things in this day and age, It's not just fashion.
It's not just a skirt. It's not just a pocket.
It's actually political, and like many things, it does raise
I think some interesting points of that gender. Absolutely, and
if you look at the consumer data, if you really

(02:40):
think about the economics of fashion and apparel, women are
the ones making those decisions in the fitting rooms more
than men. Quite frankly, women are the biggest spenders when
it comes to fashion. Women of every age group consistently
outspend their male counterparts on apparel. According to the Sage
Business Researcher back in fifteen, the average annual expenditures when

(03:03):
it comes to how much you're spending money on clothing
peaked for both groups in the thirty five to forty
four age range. Oh so I have more spending ahead
you women. I'm a vestip shop any be shopping. We're
the women spending so one thousand, five one dollars a
year and men spending nine sixty one. Those are kind

(03:25):
of big numbers. Are kind of big numbers. So women,
women be shopping. We were the biggest consumers when it
comes to fashion. We spend the most money. And that's
why I think it's so frustrating that these retailers are
still not giving us products that fit for our lives
and are functional for our bodies. I think you see
that in a whole different way when it comes to
plus size women in the clothing options that are available
to them. But even something as small as pockets, I

(03:47):
think really demonstrates how this industry that is dominated by
women consumers and should be giving us things that fit
our lives and our needs, it's just really failing. Well,
it's it's that fashion over function for warm, right, It's
this decision someone is making that I think it's important
for us that our clothes are fashionable. I think consumers

(04:09):
care about fashion, but somebody is saying fashion is more
important than function. Well, actually, Emily, a lot of experts
out there would agree with you. One reason why people
say that there are so few pockets of women's clothing
is because mid range fashion, that stuff like you and
I are probably wearing a lot of, you know, your
gaps and your j cruse, those are actually dominated by
male designers, and male designers are much more concerned with

(04:31):
things like fit and drape than functionality. Over at the Atlantic,
they interviewed Camilla Olsen, who is a creative director of
a high tech fashion firm, and she says that there's
inherent sexism within the industry that keeps things like pockets
and other functional garments being standard in women's clothing. She
goes on to say, Honestly, I believe the fashion industry
is not helping women advance, and the lack of functional

(04:51):
design for women is one example. We women know that
clearly we need pockets to carry technology, and I think
it's expected that we were going to carry a purse
when they're working. We don't, okay, persons around a pocket
is a reasonable thing. And so I think it's interesting
how she makes this point that because of the heavy
male dominated fashion industry, women aren't getting clothing that's actually
functional for us to live our lives. That's so sad.

(05:13):
It seems like such a missed opportunity. And yet again,
if you look at every industry, once you get to
the top ranks, like the director ranks of pretty much
every industry, you start to see women become fewer and
farther between. And even though there are some notable exceptions,
I think Jenna Lyons was a really noteworthy creative director
who put Jaku on the map quite frankly in the

(05:35):
odds right, Um, it's so true that even in the
female dominated spaces like retail, when you look at the
creative directors who are wielding the most power making the
biggest decisions that influence the direction of design, they're still
predominantly male. Yeah. What a mismatch between the audience that

(05:55):
you're trying to serve and the decision makers. Because how
could an industry that purports to serve women have so
few women at the at the highest highest levels and
get it so wrong when it comes to giving us
things that we actually can use. I don't know, but
it's I think it's yet another case for wide diversity
and leadership is actually good for business. Definitely. Do you
wear a lot of J Crew. I don't own a

(06:16):
single piece of Jake. Here's my beef with J Crew.
I used to love J Crew when it was cool,
functional things that fit. Now I feel like I go
in there and everything is like embellished. I'm like, how
do I watch this? It will be like a shirt
that has bedazzled stuff on it, and I'm like, how
do I watch this? Is my first thought whenever I
pick up something from Anthropology or Jay Crew these days.
And Yeah, and you were not missing anything other than

(06:38):
having clothes that are dirty forever in your closet because
you can't wash them. I seem to recall a Fabreeze
conversation we've had on there. There was a Fabrize conversation
and I'm sure that was a J Crew garment in question.
So let's get this straight. Bridget doesn't wash her hoodies.
She for breezes her hoodies, and Ergenes doesn't wash her jeans,
and now all of your other garments from an anthropology

(06:59):
and I'm not doing any laundry. You're like, I'm piecing together.
You're just not watching anything. I approved that message, girl.
I know you know what I think I just thought
of as we were planning for this episode. It didn't
come up. But I'm going to sound like a walking
talking ad for one of our sponsores right now. But
how is the rental clothing industry changing this? Because I mean,

(07:23):
I looked at that number, fift dollars expenditure a year
and I'm like, get on that Latote bandwagon right like,
where clear the Litote sponsors our podcast? And I'm also,
where did you get that jacket? I've always send to
toe and lttote right now, but between rents the runway
and litote and subscription rental services like that. You never
have to do launching again, well not even that, I don't, yes,

(07:46):
because you can send your clothes back dirty, which is
part of the perk. And furthermore, I don't spend on
I don't buy clothes anymore. I just rent. I love it. Yeah,
it's like Netflix for clothes. Yes, I like it anyway.
So that's why I haven't stepped footing in an anthropology
in a deck in. At a certain point, I wonder
if it's sort of we're going culturally, We're going less
toward owning and more toward renting things like you know,

(08:07):
why have a car where you can use lift? Why?
You know? It's it seems like that like we're heading
towards that as a culture in some weird way sharing
economy for sure. And I wonder if that's a net
positive for the environmental impact of clothing. Do you think
people throw out tons of clothes all the time because
this is like up cycling? Oh yeah, well actually, Emily,
the average American talks about eighty two pounds of textile
waste each year, which adds up to eleven million tons

(08:29):
from just our country, just from America that a lot
of clothing being thrown out. Wow. So I just I
think the sharing economy can sort of be part and
parcel with this minimalist movement, and I wonder how that
will impact the way that designers are making clothing design decisions.
I hope we'll see more pockets. Maybe I can have
a small influence by just renting things with pockets, Like,

(08:50):
it's very cool you're doing part. If you're doing your
part for pocket equality, you know. I wish I could
show you all the jacket and wearing right now. It's
got some deep pockets. It's got deep pockets, and it's
super chic and functional and by the way, it's reversible. Yeah, okay,
I'm like, come on, sponsors, give us more. Oh my god,
you know what you look like right now that you

(09:11):
ever watched The Fresh Prince how he turns his jacket
inside out, his uniform jacket, That's exactly what's happening right now.
It's got like a leather shoulder decals and now on
the inside feels like this nice little like pad like
shoulder pad. It's cute, right, this is now a jacket
centric podcast. Sorry, they're like what are you dragging about?
We can't see we'll post. Okay, good, I'm ready. So

(09:33):
it's interesting that you say that this minimalist sort of
sharing economy, um cultural thing might be influencing our fashion.
Another thing that has really been influential on whether or
not garments of pockets is technology. So back when the
iPhone six came out, you might remember, it's pretty pretty large,
and most men's garments actually had pockets where you could
put your iPhone in, but women's garments really didn't. And

(09:55):
so when the iPhone came out, the new big one,
a lot of people were like, yeah, like, I can't
put this in my pocket. What am I gonna do?
I'm gonna have to carry it in my hand or
put it in my bag or whatever. And actually, mash
double talked to five different fashion brands Levi's, l L,
beIN J Crew, American Eagle, and Lee to ask them
if this new iPhone was going to have them adding

(10:16):
bigger pockets to their women's garments. Most of them gave
some kind of variation of maybe, we'll see, but for
the most part the answer was a no. I wonder
if they did, though, because I am a gap gene
loyalist because once I found a pair of jeans that
actually fit my body, I was like, Okay, I'm done
shopping around because this is hard. But I've split a

(10:36):
few pairs of pockets like jeans in my time because
I do have the Giant, I have the Giant plus
the six plus and the back. The front pocket is
a non starter, right, not not going in there, Not
going in there. But I had a whole appear because
I was shoving my Giant phone in my butt pocket
and it definitely was not fitting. But I like, forced it. Oh,

(10:57):
don't force it, touche I. I have since found that
the genes as of late, the ones I've bought in
the last maybe three or four years have worked fine.
I really do feel like putting an iPhone in your
back pocket is a recipe for it falling into the
toilet in a public race room. So I'm I'm very
skeptical about putting anything back there. Your case is gigantic. Yeah,

(11:17):
I actually have the smaller version of the iPhone, but
my huge, ostentatious phone case makes it impossible to put
in any kind of pocket whatsoever. Now it's not happening,
not happening what would you say is in your pockets
on average, like the functional garments with pockets, Like what
might you find in a bridget Todd pocket. Well, I've
actually kind of trained myself to not carry a lot
of stuff if I don't have my backpack on me,

(11:38):
so usually like I'll do debit card, I D chapstick keys,
like I'm oh, headphones, So I'm I'm down to this
five staples I traveled like and headphones like the the
earbuds can fit into the front pocket. Yeah, that's good.
I'm a chapstick person too. One of the things I
think is kind of interesting is how the ability of
men to be able to carry things like cell phones
and women not really having that option for their pockets

(12:00):
might play out in the workplace. The article that I
it's referenced from The Atlantic makes this point pretty succinctly.
They say a man can simply swipe up his keys
and an iPhone on the way to a rendezvous with
his coworkers and slip them back into his pocket. A
woman on the way to that same meeting has to
either carry those items in her hand or bring a
whole purse with her. A definitive silent sign that she
is a woman. So what you're basically saying is that

(12:21):
there's this added visual acknowledgement of gender differences, which we
actually know if you look at the research on uh,
there's some interesting research that's been done on perfumes. Perfumes
that are especially feminine that sort of just provide a
little sensory reminder of your womanhood can backfire in interviews. Interesting,

(12:44):
so even though it seems really small, like a tiny detail,
it can still sort of come up in ways that
you maybe you don't expect. Well, it sort of gives
you this impression, Oh, she's a girly girl, or the
purse can be like, what kind of purse is it?
Is she a kind of woman who has a nice
purse that she takes care of, or like me, trashes
every person she's ever owned because I can't seem to

(13:06):
keep any of my belongings in nice shape, and what
does that say about her? It's just another way for
people to judge you. Interesting. This is kind of a
random anecdote, but I have a friend who is a
military wife, and one of the things that she says
of all that sort of hurtful, ridiculous stereotypes about military wives.
One of them that I found the most curious was

(13:27):
if she owns a coach bag, that means like that
the stereotype is that means something about what kind of
military spouse that she is, which I found very unusual.
It's such a specific thing, oh, because it plays into
the fact that like military wives are just leeches benefits
of like the governments exactly. So yeah, so they say, like,
if a woman has a coach bag and she's trying
to you know, she's a military spouse, that means that

(13:49):
she's YadA yadd some some negative stereotype there. So it's
interesting how these markers of femininity, even though they seem
quite small or quite you know, like they're not deals,
actually people can use them to make unfair assumptions about
what kind of person you are exactly. Yeah, that's a
good point. And I also, on the flip side, have

(14:09):
bonded with many a strong, powerful, influential woman over purses.
Yeah you know what I mean, Like in our own
company here, I was, well, there's a certain someone in
the higher highest ranks of leadership and how stuff works
who is a boss lady all shout out to the
fact that we've got women running thanks running things that

(14:31):
have stuff works, one of whom is like intimidating, lee,
powerful and awesome. And I met her in a very
formal boardroom like setting when I was just interviewing for
this particular job, and I'm trying my best to be
impressive and articulate and also humble and courteous and respectful
all the same time. And uh, you know, it was

(14:53):
a pretty formal exchange until we met up again later
in a less formal setting at the bar, and my
ostentatious turquoise purse became the thing we bonded over. And
now I'm like, oh, I'm in we got this, We
got this relationship on lack and look at where we
are now. Yeah, it seems like it worked out well.
It didn't work out well. So it's just an interesting

(15:14):
thing how in a male dominated space, your purse might
be something that holds you back, but when you're when
we have more women in leadership, maybe purses can. Like
you and I've bonded over backpacks, Maybe purses can actually
be a way to bond with one another. Well, it's
interesting that you bring up purses because the history of
the handbag actually has a lot to do with why
the pockets on women's garments tend to be so sucky.

(15:36):
And let's dive into that after this quick break, and
we're back now. I know that I've been complaining about
pockets today, and maybe you've been complaining about the pockets
on your garment, but women have actually been complaining about
the lack of pockets on their clothing. For quine of
a long time back in Charlotte P. Gilman wrote, one

(16:00):
supremacy there is in men's clothing is adaptatitions of pockets.
Show this in The New York Times. She continues to say,
women have, from time to time carried bags, sometimes sewn in,
sometimes tied on, sometimes brandished in the hand. But a
bag is not a pocket, and she's rights in Christian
Duor was quoted in the Spectator of saying men have

(16:21):
pockets to keep things in women for decoration, because God forbid,
I have an important thing to keep on my person. Well,
it's just like it kind of reminds me of the
biking episode, in which it is a very systematic discrepancy
between it being socially acceptable for you to actually have

(16:42):
the freedom that comes with riding a bike versus women
who ride bikes seem like, oh, they could be up
to anything. Well, you actually see a lot of that
same idea playing out when it comes to the history
of pockets and women totally. Back in the medieval era,
most women had little bags or sort of satchels or
purses tied around the waste that eventually folks began sort

(17:02):
of hiding their bags under petticoats, which was a discreet
way to say I have things, right, I'm a woman
who owns stuff, and might you know, have whatever I
damn well please in my pockets. But I wouldn't ever
brandish those pockets basically in public, visible to all. That
would make me a radical woman. And in the late

(17:23):
seventeenth century, even when pockets became much more commonplace and
sewed into men's clothing, women did not have built in
pockets because that would have been taboo. So they continued
to have these sort of tied on versions until the
French Revolution really changed the game when wide skirts were
out out with let them eat cake style of the

(17:44):
French Revolution, and what became much more in vogue were
skirts closer to the body, sort of less flamboyant really,
so there was less room for pockets, so that whole
pocket conversation became null and void for women who continued
to harry the reticule, a small decorative purse instead of

(18:04):
God forbid they should go out in public with pockets,
because they would be outing themselves as a woman with things,
maybe having things of her own. God, heaven forbid you
have to carry things and be a woman. What I
love is that in the eighteen hundreds, the Irrational Dress
Society began pushing for women to abandon the stiffness. Of course,
it's for looser clothes that had lots and lots of pockets. Radical, radical,

(18:26):
can you imagine? Founded in eighteen nine, the Rational Dress
Society called for women to dress for health, ditching corsets
in favor of boneless days and bloomers, wearing loose trousers,
and adopting clothing that allowed for movement, especially bicycling. So
it is connected, it is, It's very much connected. It's
very much connected. An eighteen New York Times piece made

(18:46):
this really really funny many sort of tongue in cheek
claim that civilization itself is actually founded on pockets. They write,
as we became more civilized, we need more pockets. No
pocketless people have ever been great since pockets were invent
it and the female sex cannot rival us while it
is pocketless. So basically this was like a very overt
and clearly insecure male person saying, um, you know, let's

(19:10):
keep women out of power, let's not allow them to
have pockets. I've often and this is not our research point,
it's just my own opinion. I've often not that heels
with the same way, right, while women are tottering around
on heels, we'll keep them well. Then used to wear
heels all the time during the American Revolution, right, So
if you think about it, men ditched heels, kicked off

(19:31):
the heels, and women's heels got taller. I almost wonder
if the men were like, hey, we're having trouble getting
from point A to point B on these heels. This
is dumb. Let's wear regular shoes and then pressure women
into wearing heels. I think that's the next episode, right,
I think you have to do on our how a
tire got gendered, because think about it, like, did you
know that for button up shirts, men's buttons are on

(19:54):
one side and women's buttons are on the other, Like
there are so many weird little particulars about gendered clothing
that have these fascinating histories. Oh my gosh, let's do
more on that. I love that. So just bringing it
back to pockets for a second, this idea of pockets
for women was a total game changer for gun toten
bike riding women, which I thought was amazing. Back in

(20:17):
eight one designer of women's bicycle costumes, which were what
they were called at the time, the things that these
daring women who biked might actually wear even included pockets
for pistols. Quote. Not all of them want to carry
a revolver, said the anonymous tailor, quoted by the New
York Times at the time. But a large percentage do,

(20:38):
and make no bones about saying so. Even when they
do not tell me why they want the pocket, they
often betray their purpose by asking to have it lined
with duck or leather. So basically, this tailor is like
sewing in duck lined pockets for these women on bicycles
to carry their handguns with them. And you've got I mean,
you've got to hand it to these pistol packing bike

(21:00):
riding turn of the centry women in bloomers and split
skirt suits because they're right to vote. You know, granted
in the Nineteenth Amendment was still twenty six years away
when these women were practicing their Second Amendment rights. Well,
what I love about this is that it almost goes
back to our episode about biking and that are all
sort of connected to this idea of freedom where they

(21:20):
can have free reign. Men don't know what they're getting
up to where they're going, and it's like, yeah, I'm
a woman that's got to carry and stuff to do
it coulis to be Yeah, and I've got pockets and
you don't need to get to know what's inside of
them exactly. It really comes down to being a symbol
of freedom and mobility. Isn't it funny though, that like
a pocket was considered so much more suspicious than a purse.
What the hell, I'm not a gun owner, but I

(21:42):
would imagine you'd be a lot more likely to put
a gun in, yeah, a boot. Think about the West,
you know, the women of the West. They all are
packing pistols and their stockings. Sounds like our next episode.
All I can think about right now are the women
of West World, which we could we should unpack that series.
I haven't seeking at a KSh up on it that
I'm obsessed. Okay, I gotta this is my next, my

(22:02):
next show it. So again you have pockets playing out
through all these different parts of history when it comes
to women. Um, pockets were a big, big part of
the Suffragette movement. If you think about those white Suffragette
suits that are that our sisters used to wear a
lot of times those head pockets. In nineteen ten, the
New York Times had a headline that said, blenty of
pockets in the Suffragette suit, and it really makes the

(22:24):
point that pockets is connected to voting or being someone
that's interested in voting. The article goes on to say
it has pockets of plenty, and it's exactly what you'd
expect for a woman with polls on her mind. I
love it. And they go on to say that it's
all within sight and the things in her pockets would
be easy to find even for the wearer. So I
just think it's funny that what's radical about that is

(22:44):
like someone is daring to wear pockets in broad daylight
and broad daylight, like, what what are they doing? Right?
You don't know, you don't know. So if you want
to pick a deep dive into the history of pockets.
I definitely recommend this really long throw article un Racked.
One of the points they made about pockets and the
suffragets is that there was a kind of anxiety around

(23:04):
women that had pockets. They right, this last bit about visible,
straightforward pockets hinted all the lingering anxiety over women's clothing, privacy,
and property. It's not merely that women will strut with
their hands in their pockets on point the challenge men,
It's that women's pockets could carry something secret, something private,
something deadly. Yeah, you never thought about pockets as being

(23:25):
this mysterious. I mean, we just carry chapstick in ours,
but you don't know what we got in there. You know.
It makes me feel like I need to get some
more edgy pocket filler items, Like maybe my chapstick is
disappointing a little when when you think about that some
women were expressly using pockets to carry guns. Your chapstick
seems a little bit wimpy, right, Not that we're saying like,

(23:47):
go lock and load in your pockets. Get ready, patriarchy
and we should do an episode women in gun control.
That's a whole that's a good one. So I really like,
it's interesting how something as small as pockets actually has
this really dense political and gendered history. But you know,

(24:08):
why do we even think about women's clothing versus men's
clothing in the first place. Let's talk more about that
after this quick break and we're back talking about men's
pockets versus women's pockets. But really, what's the big deal
with gendered clothing anyway? Like, why do we have clothing

(24:30):
that's this kind of way for men and this kind
of way for women. That doesn't seem to be the
way that gender plays out, And so it's interesting that
that's the way that it plays out when it comes
to clothing. I mean, we've seen the rebellion on the
toy aisle, right, We've seen how the Pink Barbie aisle
and the Blue Boys Toys aisle have become a thing
of the past. And I love seeing that retailers are
starting to question whether these strict binary sections for women's

(24:55):
versus men's clothing really makes sense anymore. And I would
I mean, I would argue that most of our listeners
to identify as women shop in the women's department, and
the question is, like, should there be a women's department.
Well that's the thing. I mean, we know gender isn't
a binary, so it seems like we should stop treating
clothes like their binary. I actually do wear a lot
of men's clothing because my style icons are probably James

(25:18):
Dean and Pugsley Adams from the Atoms and Way sort
of if they had a kid and that kid wore
a lot of black. So yeah, I definitely am down
with a little bit of um, you know, unisex clothing.
But I think it's interesting how you see big retailers
who can really be shaping how these industries think about
gender and clothing, saying no, we're gonna move away from
gendered things and have a more unisex vibe. Self Ridges,

(25:40):
a high end department store in the UK, announced that
it was getting rid of gendered floors and it would
just have three floors of fashion merchandise together so that
customers could shop according to their own self expression. And
other high end designers like J. W. Anderson, Rick Owens
and rad Harani have championed gender neutral clothing and the

(26:00):
approaches filtered down to the high street sort of H
and M and Zara, which have both created non gendered ranges,
which I think is really interesting because a androgynous style
has always been a mainstay on the runway, right, I
mean you've even seen it more like on the runway
these days. You've seen a lot of notable examples of

(26:21):
people just having you know, more androgynous style, which I
always thought was really cool, really cool. And I really
think that the hipster moment was a turning point because
hipster fashion, as cliche as it has become, that sort
of Brooklyn beanie wearing hip look looks very identical when

(26:42):
expressed by someone who identifies as a man versus a woman,
and there was sort of this weird backlash I think
when hipster style became more mainstream, which was that you've
stolen the look of lesbians, or that you've stolen this
look from like the Game movie. And I wonder if
like the mains dreaming of gender neutral dress is a

(27:03):
co opting Oh that's fascinating of like LGBT style or
is that a good thing? Is that a bad thing?
Just the thing that's happening. I don't know. Yeah, I
will say that when so I came of age and
like the scene st hipster time, if you remember that time,
it was the Alt adds, so we were all dressing
kind of weird, low slung jeans. But I remember when
skinny genes became a thing, my then boyfriend was wearing

(27:26):
my jeans. We were just like staring. We were just
like wearing each other's jeans, which I love. Yeah, Brad,
and I still do that. I actually lent a guy
a pair of jeans. I don't think I ever got
those back. Well. I really hope that this pushed towards
unisex and gender neutral clothing will get us the pocket
equality we all know, we all deserve, yes, because pockets
are functional as they are fashionable. The idea of adding

(27:47):
pockets to something for the look without the functionality makes
me want to tear my hair out. So I would
rather see retailers just chewing pockets altogether, then adding a
stupid decorative pocket just to create frustration and disappointment. In
bridget Todd specifically, yeah, yeah, save you the trouble, because
we all know. You know, when you try on a
dress and it has really good, deep, functional pockets, it

(28:10):
is the best. I love how Tracy Moore put it
over at jez Bell and trust me, this is gonna
sound like an exaggeration, but I don't believe it is,
because this is how much I appreciate good pockets. Humor me.
I want you to remember the last time you bought
a piece of clothing with pockets, real ones, usable ones,
ones that fit things like the standard night out keys phone,

(28:30):
I D lip gloss compact. It's a rare thin no,
maybe an a line dress or skirt, something vintage with
a full bodied lower half. And the moment you discovered
that not only was the fabric perfect, the fit amazing,
but there were actual functioning pockets. Let me ask you,
was it not the greatest moment of your life? Did
it not add a skip to your step? Were you

(28:51):
not astonished each time you reach down and slid your
hands into the outrageously useful fabric compartment? When women complimented
you on the outfit, do not reveal to them with
exclamatory glee that it also possessed something unexpected and lovely
And was that thing not pockets? I think that is
so true because you're on the dance floor and someone's like,

(29:12):
nice dress, and you're like, no, you don't understand this.
This thing has pockets. It has pockets, like check it out, Like,
you don't even know how great this romper is, girl,
let me show you. Okay, pockets full on pockets. It
makes you want to empty them out and like turn
them in inside out. I gotten this pocket many. I
have had many a drunken night in a lady's room

(29:33):
at a nightclub where I'm like, check out these Oh
you think this is a nice dress? Check it out
like it's like you're it's like the bass drop on
the n And they're always like they always get women
when it comes to pockets. Women always get it. And
then it becomes where did you get this? We need
this in my life? Yes, yeah, that's so true. It's
bonding over pockets. Well, smithy listeners, I hope that we

(29:53):
just bonded over pockets. I know you and I just
bonded our pockets. But I want to hear from you.
What has this experience been like in your own time?
What do you think about the rise of non gender
binary clothing being available. Do you have any feels when
you put on the pants of your loved ones and
it fits or doesn't fit, or what does that experience

(30:15):
like for you? Do you wish you had more pockets
all the time. Have pockets revolutionized your life? Tell us
you can reach us on Instagram and tag us in
all those pocket pictures at stuff mom Never Told You.
Tweet at us on Twitter at mom Stuff Podcast, and
send us a good old beast and email at mom
stuff at how stuff works dot com.