Suzanne Harrington: Life’s too short for bras and zips and waxing

I’m holding an oddly shaped garment at arm’s length, squinting at it. It looks uncomfortable, and dimly familiar. Oh yes. A bra. I haven’t really seen one since March 2020. How do they work again? Do I have to?

Where I live - a Corkonian replanted in Brighton - bras are being dug out of hibernation, along with tight frocks and dangerous shoes. Not for nightclubs – they’re not open yet – but for brunch. Queues outside lazy brunch places look like midnight queues by velvet ropes, except in blinding sunshine; over excited, over dressed people grappling with their Covid apps to check in for overpriced toast. The beach looks like Ibiza styled by Primark. Nobody is in Ibiza – they’re all here.

Yay for people having fun at last. But does this mean we have to actually get dressed again? Because I’m not that keen. After so long in Sweaty Bettys, sliders, wellies and a swimming costume, the idea is a bit overwhelming. Zips? Buttons? Stuff that doesn’t stretch? A whole section of wardrobe, where the unyielding garments live, remains as closed off as Gatwick last Christmas. I’m not sure I want to reopen it. Getting dressed feels like…….work.

In fact, all of our re-emergence from lockdown feels like work. Literally, social work. Let’s catch up – those words we have been gagging to hear – are now blanket bombing us. Fantastic. At last. Except I’m knackered and it’s only been a few weeks. After all that time when the biggest daily decision was which teabag, and social interaction little more than muffled pleasantries at the till, almost overnight we are in a whirl of bars, cafes, shops, crowds. Booking things, filling diaries, making arrangements. I’m on the verge of collapse.

See, here’s the thing. In lockdown, we established a new groove to our lives. A simpler one. And while not properly seeing each other sucked, the calm of this new groove turned out to be quite lovely (unless you had small kids, of course, in which case you’re probably still in trauma therapy). But at least there was no FOMO. We were all missing out together, in a weird, dull, comforting solidarity.

Now we have to put our bras back on. We have to think about grooming. The only grooming I’ve been doing all lockdown is a friend’s carthorse in a muddy field; underneath my raingear is the body of a lady gorilla. The idea of stampeding to the salon to be trimmed, waxed, buffed and shined – that is, hedge trimmed, lawn mowered, sandblasted– seems even more arduous than refamiliarizing myself with zips. Never mind party frocks, I can’t even cope with jeans. Would it be ok to stay hairy, in trainers and trackpants? In this age of identifying as whatever you feel you are, can I identify as a lady mammal, rather than having to re-engage with the manmade construct of lady human? Because if lockdown has taught me one thing, it’s that life’s too short to be underwired.