Hats

I have a thing about hats.  I sort of love them, especially when they are ridiculously fancy and ornate.  I don't know when this obsession started exactly.  Maybe back in high school when my friend and I began to wear "Easter bonnets" every year on Easter Sunday.

In reality, though, it might go back further than that.  I have, somewhere, a Goofy hat with floppy ears from DisneyWorld, a giant Mad Hatter's hat from Six Flags.  Maybe this addiction to ridiculous headgear has been a lifelong thing, then.

I started finding old hats in antique malls, and their styles, colors, fabrics seemed to demand that I put them on.  They were like little windows into other ages.  Some are classy and elegant.  Some of them were utterly dramatic.  Some of them were completely over the top.  I suppose it's a little like playing dress-up.  When I see them, I always wonder if the women who wore them originally wore them in times of joy, if those hats went to social functions or parties where the ladies felt happy.  I like to think so.

It also makes me feel sad to see them cast-off in the shops, especially the ultra-dramatic ones.  To me, they almost seem to cry out for someone to love them.  I can't resist them.  I have only a few of these; it's not like I buy every one I see, but the ones I do get have definite personality.

I don't know where I'll ever wear these.  I would like sometime to get all my friends together and for all of us to wear an odd hat and go out to eat.  My friend who went shopping with me today when I found my latest "rescue" suggested that I wear it to Winn-Dixie on a Tuesday just for the hell of it.  That made me laugh and laugh.  Some horrid Tuesday, I just might.  For the time being, it's enough to have them, take a silly picture in them that I might use for my FaceBook or Twitter profile photo, and then hang them up on my wall.  It's a harmless enough thing all the way around, I think, and a way of reclaiming something old and giving it new life.