There’s a fashion trend among Millennials. They often appear in public looking as if they just rolled out of bed, in mussed bed-head, smeared mascara, and still clad in pajamas. It’s ironic that when I was in middle school, I often woke in a panic after a recurrent nightmare in which I’d showed up at school still wearing my pajamas. It was mortifying! I guess now it’s intentional.

Because of hot flashes and night sweats, I didn’t wear pajamas for many years. Even a flimsy nightgown often ended up soaked with sweat. In the dead of winter, windows were thrown open, fans turned on high, and blankets thrown to the floor. Then suddenly it was over. It seems there’s a mighty short gap between hot flashes and potential frostbite. I’m now frequently numb with cold, regardless of the weather. Whichever hormone was in charge of regulating my body temperature has apparently gone on strike.

When I pass the thermostat on my way to bed, it thinks the house temperature has dropped below freezing and the furnace kicks on. I snuggle under a pile of blankets as I shiver like a neurotic chihuahua in my sweatsuit and wool socks. My hands are like blocks of ice. I’m tempted to wear mittens to bed. Where’s a hot flash when you need one? If I touch my husband’s bare skin with my icy hands during the night, he awakens with a shriek. I may have to make a change. No, not the husband. He’s a keeper. I think I have to go back to the flannel pajamas of my youth.

My days of shopping at Victoria’s Secret are long gone. Nothing in there is going to warm me up, although they’d likely raise my husband’s temperature. It’ll have to be the pajama department at WalMart.

That was an eye-opening shopping spree. I felt like a tourist in a foreign country. There’d been some changes since the nightwear of my youth. Why are flannel pajamas almost always bold plaids? It’s not flattering unless you’re elfin-tiny. They make me look like a broad-shouldered lumberjack.

Why are there now pockets in pajamas? Both hip and chest. For what? During the night, what might you need so urgently that it can’t wait long enough for you to roll over and get it from the nightstand? I guess the pockets have been added for the convenience of those Millennials who are wearing them out in public. During the daytime they need them for keys, wallets, cell phones, earpods, etc. Maybe at night Millennials keep condoms in the chest pocket, in case they need romance, and a joint in case they need a smoke afterwards. I keep my hearing aids in the chest pocket, in case my husband asks about some romance, and my joint-pain ointment, in case the activity aggravates my arthritic hip.

I tried keeping my cell phone in the hip pocket of my new jammies, but I kept accidentally butt-dialing scammers. Keeping my dentures in the hip pocket didn’t work either, since I once rolled over and they bit me on the left butt cheek, leaving me with some explaining to do.

I’ve come up with a plan to stop Millennials from wearing pajamas in public. Starting this Monday, we Boomers appropriate their fad and start wearing our pajamas everywhere we go. As soon as a fad is accepted and copied by us old folks, it’ll be “the kiss of death” for any fashion statement. No Millennial would be caught dead wearing the same style as their parents and grandparents. They’ll quickly move on to something else. Hopefully, something less offensive, although that’s unlikely.

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