The apron is making a comeback
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BY ERIN ANDERSEN /Lincoln Journal Star
EllynAnne Geisel ties one on first thing in the morning. She ties one on when cooking — and cleaning — and hosting company. Although her mother was never known to indulge in one, millions of women before her have.
And this Wednesday — the day before Thanksgiving — Geisel is asking women across America to stop baking pumpkin pie and preparing cranberry relish just long enough to mark the very first ever National Tie One On Day.
What are we talking about?
“Aprons, of course,” Geisel said with a bit of a giggle in her southern voice.
“There is nothing that connects us like an apron.”
Yes, she’s talking about those colorful, pocketed coverups our mothers, grandmothers and great-great-great-great-great-grandmothers before us tied around their waists or slipped over their heads before going about their day.
Tie One On Day is a day to stop what we are doing in preparing the Thanksgiving meal and “think for just a second about the women before us,” Geisel explained in a telephone interview from her Pueblo, Colo., home.
As a tribute to them — and as a way “to put thanks in Thanksgiving” — Geisel invites women to wrap a loaf of bread in an apron, tuck a note of encouragement or a prayer into the pocket and deliver it to someone in need of a physical or spiritual lift.
“You take time out to think of someone else and to be grateful and remember the people before us,” Geisel said.
It’s a warm sentiment.
Not unlike the feelings aprons evoke in most women, she said.
Apron.
Say the word and an image immediately comes to mind.
Maybe it’s of your mom putting out Thanksgiving dinner, or your grandma baking cookies or your great-great-great-great-grandmother standing in front of her sod house. Maybe you think of June Cleaver. Or Donna Reed. Or Bree Van De Kamp of “Desperate Housewives” fame.
Aprons symbolize women — their strength, their love, their practicality, according to Geisel. (Of course, men wear aprons, but that generally doesn’t evoke the same emotions.)
Aprons date as far back as Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, Geisel said. After Adam took a bite of that apple, the two recognized their nakedness and created aprons, of sorts, out of fig leaves, she said.
And women have been wearing aprons ever since — or at least until about 40 years ago when we pitched them in defiance of women’s servitude to men and to show we were equal with the opposite sex.
Misplaced anger, Geisel argues.
“An apron could not be what held women back. Fabric cannot do that,” she said.
Women incorrectly viewed the apron’s ties as a sign of strangulation. Instead of putting them away, they threw them away.
“I think we wish we could take that day back,” Geisel said.
“Aprons take us back, they don’t hold us back.”
In case you hadn’t noticed, Geisel loves aprons. She has more than 400 in her collection. She wrote the book on aprons — appropriately titled “The Apron Book” (Andrews McMeel Publishing, $16.95 hard cover). She created an apron exhibit called “The Apron Chronicles” that travels the country.
She wasn’t always this apron-obsessed.
“Up until 1999, I just wiped my hand on my clothes like everyone else,” she said with a chuckle.
In 1999, her youngest child went off to college, and she began her second career — as a writer.
“So the first thing I write is an article about a piece of clothing that stands for what I have done for 24 years of my life — the apron,” she said.
She didn’t own an apron. She never wore one in all her years as a homemaker.
Her mother never wore one either.
“My mother was an enigma,” Geisel said. Her mother had a college degree, worked full time outside the home as a bookkeeper — and raised six children.
So Geisel’s new career began with a quest to find an apron. But aprons, long considered archaic and throw-away items, were hard to find. Eventually she found two in a thrift store.
“One literally spoke to me,” she said, recalling its colors and stitching.
As she washed and ironed it, she imagined the original owner doing the same thing many years earlier. And she began to wonder about that woman:
“Was she happy in her marriage? Were her children good children? Was there one child who gave her fits? Did her spirit long to do something else? Did she wear rollers during the day? Did she wear lipstick to the mailbox?”
Geisel lined an old peach basket with fabric and stored her aprons there. For four years she carried that basket of aprons everywhere.
“It was like a magnet,” she said. “People were attracted to it.”
They knew instantly what was in the basket and typically responded in one of two ways: a hand slapped to the chest followed by “oh my God that reminds me of …,” or a sharp inhale of breath followed by “my mother, my grandmother, my aunt, my somebody wore an apron just like that!”
They immediately would share their memories with Geisel.
“I wrote down what they said,” she said.
As her apron collection grew and her stack of reminiscences multiplied, she created “The Apron Chronicles,” which featuring 150 aprons and 46 stories about the women who wore them.
She also began traveling, giving Apron Memories presentations — showing her most fragile aprons.
“I love showing my aprons. I loooooovvvvveeeee showing my aprons,” she repeats. “I am a textile guardian and I take this job seriously.
“Aprons are an art.”
And aprons are her addiction.
“I keep thinking this is like a food disorder. Maybe there is an apron support group somewhere out there,” she jokes.
But seriously, “I absolutely cannot resist an apron. I will see one and, oh my, I just must have you to show off.”
Before you start to think she has tied on a few too many — consider the historical and emotional significance of that piece of fabric.
From a practical standpoint, the apron protected clothing from stains and spills. Its pockets made the homemaker’s job so much easier, holding everything she needed for the task at hand. Women ingeniously modified their aprons to their lifestyles — buttons attached to hold towels, oven mitts sewn into the skirt and sassy little aprons just for special occasions and company.
“Nothing dresses up like an apron,” Geisel gushes. “It’s like putting on lipstick. You put it on and you feel sassy and adorable.”
Most aprons are handmade. Most are brightly colored. Each is woven with memories.
One woman who now wears her mother’s old, stained, full-length apron told Geisel: It is just like folding myself into my mother’s arms. It’s like getting one big hug.
Aprons reflect the original wearer’s story and personality, Geisel said.
“The fabric holds the spirit of that woman,” she said.
Geisel is heartened by the notion that the apron is making a resurgence — along with the finer attributes of homemaking.
“Today the homemaker gene is calling people to try to create for their own families an oasis from the chaos that has become our daily life,” she said.
“When we walk into the door of our home we want it to be all about conversation, and not about confrontation. We want it to be about good smells.”
Reach Erin Andersen at 473-7217 or eandersen@journalstar.com.
Tie One On Day
The first ever National Tie One On Day is Wednesday.
Created as a tribute to women — their strength, love and endurance — the idea is to take a few minutes to celebrate the women of our past, said the Tie One On Day’s founder EllynAnne Geisel.
What she wants you to do is wrap a loaf of bread in an apron and deliver it to a neighbor, friend or someone in need of a spiritual lift. Be sure to tuck a note of encouragement or a prayer of hope into the pocket.
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