Why are Americans so obsessed with t-shirts (and tote bags, for that matter)?

We have t-shirts for everything. Literally everything. Consider the expression, “Been there. Done that. Got the T-shirt.”  Why are we as a society so consumed with this jersy knit material containing garish screenprinting proclaiming where we’ve been, what events we’ve volunteered at, teams we support, places we work, and the worst–corporate logos? T-shirts aren’t even that flattering, and they look sloppy.

Yet that doesn’t stop me from buying them or getting excited when I get them for free. Most of my t-shirts fall into several categories–sorority, vacation, schools and events.

Sorority
Gamma Sig t’s have a life of their own. During college, I served as my sorority’s t-shirt chair, so many of the shirts carry my original designs. When I put on Gamma Sig letters, I’m not just representing my sorority but the painstaking hours spent in front of Photoshop. Also factor in that 50% of sorority drama revolves around t-shirts with the remaining parts split between formal locations, who hooked up with whom at the last mixer, and who dissed whom at the last meeting.
These are rarely worn and sit in a box under my bed until I can make a t-shirt quilt.

Vacation
Maven Mom and McGuvyver Dad have a running joke with t-shirts. They whole-heartedly embraced empty nest syndrome and take really awesome trips now. Jealously, I order ask them to buy me a t-shirt and a shot glass at every location. When they were in the Bahamas, they somehow found a little kid-like shirt that said, “Someone who loves me went to the Bahamas and bought me this t-shirt.” At the time I was in college and decided to be sarcastic and wear it to the Bubble to work out. Since the gym at UT is the only non-alcoholic hook-up location, it was my attempt to be counter-cultural. The parents were shocked that I wore the shirt and continued to buy them for me. Now I have a rather large collection of variations that say, “Mom & Dad went to _____ and bought me this t-shirt.” The one from London says “Mum.”
These t-shirts will also become a t-shirt quilt one day. Actually a really funny quilt.

Schools
What can I say? I have school spirt. There’s a considerable collection of both AU and UT t-shirts in the collection. These are the ones that get mostly worn around the house or working out. This means they also get worn out, so I’m always replacing them. I do have a really funny one from OIT that says “Protect Yourself” on the front and “Protect Your Data” on the back to encourage students to back up their files. It’s just such an ugly shirt that I’ve got to keep it.

Events
During my tenure at CDM, I worked a lot of events and got a lot of t-shirts. It’s hard to throw these away because they’re good reminders of my work and ideas. The CultureFest shirt reminds me of how hot we were working in 100 degree heat (and my subsequent heat stroke), my RiverPlay shirt reminds me of working at CDM since that’s the most popular exhibit, and GoFest! reminds me of the ineptness of the Littlefield administration. (We have a lot of festivals in Chattanooga. It really is Star’s Hollow.) Then there are the myriad of t-shirts from Relay for Life. The ACS alone must keep the t-shirt industry alive in this country.
These shirts are hardly worn and just sit in my dresser.

Surprisingly enough, I’ve managed to throw away quite a bit. Since my t-shirts represent so much of my life, I feel like I’m throwing away parts of it when a t-shirt is thrown into the Goodwill bag. I just keep telling myself that Mrs. M would toss it and much more.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 27th, 2007 at 3:09 am and is filed under randomness. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.