Blue Jeans

Photo by JESHOOTS.COM on Unsplash

Blue Jeans

We usually remember our important firsts, or someone remembers them for us. Our first step, first tooth, first word. First birthday, first day of school, first kiss. What I remember is my first pair of blue jeans.

My grandfather looked at them and deemed me blue jean bai at the age of eight. Blue jean lady, that was me. We had just moved into our first real house, yellow with brick-red trim. With a real backyard. In a real neighborhood, with real American kids. The first day of school I met Jenny Carlson, a skinny blond girl who was the same age as me. She walked up the street to our bus stop, wearing perfectly rolled blue jeans. And I felt embarrassed.

My mother had insisted that I wear elastic-waist corduroy pants or dresses to school. “Blue jeans are sloppy,” she would say. I had to look neat, I was the eldest. And no proper Indian girls wore sloppy blue jeans. Tears and tantrums, nothing worked. When there was finally enough money, there was no time to go shopping. So I showed up at the bus stop in a red cotton dress.

All I wanted was to fit in. I was convinced that people stared at me, at my family, because we were different. We had brown skin, black hair. Our house always smelled like turmeric and mustard seed oil. We didn’t go to church. We didn’t speak English in the house. We were different.

When I saw Jenny, I knew. I knew those blue jeans were everything I had wanted. If I could have them, I would fit in. I wouldn’t be so different at least. Because normal American kids wore blue jeans, rolled up at the bottom. I tugged at my cotton dress and grimaced; how would I make it through school?

Somehow I managed through the first week. Every day my mother dressed me in dresses or pants. No jeans, just regular pants. One day I finally got up the courage to ask her to take me shopping.

“No, you have plenty of clothes.”

“But Mommy, this is important.”

“Why do you need more pants? Look you have so many nice pants and nice dresses.”

She just didn’t get it. I could feel the tears collecting in my eyelashes.

“Please!”

“Look — ”

“Rekha, why don’t you just take her?” My father. Relief. He was tired of hearing the constant arguments. We couldn’t afford it, but the fighting had to end. So my mother conceded, and we piled into the rusty red Chevy Nova, drove straight to K-Mart.

The store was bright, and everything looked new and inviting. But I had a mission. We walked to the Girls’ department, and I had to stop to take it all in. A whole rack of blue jeans, all sizes, all shades. And luckily, I was too young to notice the price tags.

I rushed over to touch them, to feel the comfort of the rough fabric between my fingers. I felt the thick folds at the waist, the smooth straightness of the leg, the bumpy stitching at the hem. My mother looked horrified. I knew they would cost too much.

But she didn’t say no. She stood next to me and sorted through the sizes, the shades, the textures. Some were as dark as the night sky, some the color of ocean water, some almost white. Some with elastic, some with pleats, some with one button and some with three or four. I hooked my fingers in the belt loops and smiled. Which one would I choose?

My mother had found a pair she liked. Which pretty much meant she had decided for me. But it didn’t matter. We walked to the fitting room to try them on. And they were wonderful. Dark blue, with a little gold zipper. Two pockets in front, two in back. Perfect.

The rest of the afternoon is a blur. We bought the jeans, drove home. I modeled them for everyone until my mother made me put them away so I wouldn’t get them dirty. I felt like I would burst, and I couldn’t stop smiling.

I wore those blue jeans to school the next day, and I felt good. And I kept wearing them, as much as my mother would let me (which wasn’t much). I was a real American kid, just like Jenny, just like everyone else.

At least for the time being.

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