vintage hatology

I missed a hat show yesterday. An interesting woman of a certain age whom I'd met a few days before, invited me to her show at a local gallery. "They're fun and you can try them all on," she said, by way of enticement. She is a designer - and a character - her hats are probably fun. I remembered the array of outlandish hats at the royal wedding a few weeks ago (which kind of stole the show) so I was curious. Unfortunately, the air was dense, the temperature hot, and after a couple of pleasant hours in a coffee shop knitting and talking with a friend, I needed to get home and stay there. But it got me thinking about hats.

This is an actual authentic hatbox from a long defunct New York City, Fifth Avenue shop. I keep family memorabilia in it. It's left over from the days when hats were still obligatory in church. Fashion had, by the mid-1950s already discarded the hat for "going out" - which meant "leaving your house to go anywhere" (see 1940s movies) but the Catholic hierarchy still required females to cover their heads in church. As the decade progressed the somethings we put on our heads got smaller....

and smaller...

These head coverings and the hatbox were old when I rescued them from my mother's attic in 1989! The last time I was in a church was for my great grandson Dante's christening last month (along with three other families and babies). Not only were there no hats, but a couple of people were wearing jeans cutoffs and flip flops and the presiding priest had a tiny microphone attached to his surplice which effectively garbled his words so that no one understood what he said. A variety of cleavages and stilettos were prominent. But I do like the idea of hats and I'm sorry I missed Katy's Paris/Taos show.

Meanwhile, having taken the old hatbox down from the top shelf of the linen closet I'm now tripping down memory lane. I'll share one more thing. My father's fishing hat. The boat was called The Apache and ran out of City Island - where I recently visited after decades and decades.  There wasn't enough time to explore the town or look for the boat. We were all too busy talking and eating during a long lunch outside, near the water, at a venerable old seafood restaurant that my father used to frequent (long before sushi was added to the menu!).

When Dominic died, his fishing buddies sent a huge arrangement of white flowers adorned with a ribbon that read "from your friends on The Apache". We added to the arrangement a collection of notes we'd found that he'd left for his wife (who never threw anything away), written on pieces of cardboard and ripped paper bags that read GONE FISHING!