ode to the holiday sweater.

Yes, we all know about the glory of the christmas sweater. Full-on snow scenes, jingle bells, heartbreakingly intricate santas of felt and puff paint, googly-eyed reindeer, zigzag knits, ho ho ho's cascading over be-ribboned christmas trees. I think the christmas sweater is one of the few articles of clothing that is fashionably able to break the fourth wall, which is to say, the worth of your christmas sweater is determined almost entirely by the amount and quality of 3-D shit hanging off the front of it. The weeks between Thanksgiving and New Years are like the mardi-gras of egregious fashion: the more beads (and felt, tinsel, hot glue, puffballs, eyeballs, etc.) attached to you, the more your hip factor skyrockets.

I seriously have to channel the will of Odysseus when they unleash the holiday sweaters on the racks at Goodwill. Although, if I acted on all of my thrifting impulses, I could clothe every citizen of Rhode Island in needle-point kitten vests and 80s bridesmaid dresses. A biblical image of paradise.

The real point of this post, however, is to recognize the holiday die-hards: the halloween and thanksgiving sweaters. These, to me, represent a sort of sad holiday desperation. Why are they at the thrift store? Did a sweet grandmother lose her faith in thanksgiving's joy? Did she die and leave behind a collection of amazing holidaywear unappreciated by her unworthy family? Am I freakishly morbid about festive fashion? Should I just buy an XXL traffic-cone orange fruit-of-the-loom sweatshirt with the word "BOO!" emblazoned across the shapeless chest and wear it proudly with plastic pumpkin earrings, every single day until it becomes appropriate to bust out my thanksgiving-wear, proclaiming my devout holiday extravagance?

Maybe.

But probably (dear god absolutely) not.