Who Are All These Buttless Women?

The other day, The Modern Gal talked about avoiding the new Gap jeans because they have pocket flaps and she has some junk in her trunk she doesn't feel like accentuating. My immediate thought was, "damn, guess I can't get new jeans at Gap anytime soon," because my trunk is also not without some junk.

Even when I used to run seven miles a day and was in the absolute best shape of my life (something I'm working to get back to/surpass), my derriere was the most pronounced feature of my figure, and I had a horrible time finding jeans. And I don't think my shape is unusual. I think I am the prime example of average. So why isn't anyone making clothes for me?

Yesterday, after trying on 16 pairs of jeans, (a task I equate to torture), I came up with nothing. I want a pair of classy, grown-up jeans, to pair with a crisp shirt or a chunky sweater, so I can shake my overgrown skateboard-chic style and dress more age appropriately, but in order to find a pair that doesn't gap at the waist and squeeze my rear up to my hips, I end up with super super low rise jeans that don't have any sort of waist what-so-ever, and the second they stretch, they start heading south. There's nothing classy about perpetual plumbers butt. There's also nothing nice about jeans with pockets that are so far apart it looks like my butt is headed in two very different directions at the same time.

And I'm a size 8/9. If trying on jeans is making me feel awful, what about women who wear a 12 or 14 or 16 or 18? They can't be having an easy time of it either. We don't all come in one size! Don't we all deserve the chance to feel good about ourselves and look good in our clothes? Haven't we gotten past the point where looking like a stick figure is our ideal? I just want to be healthy and fit. Why isn't that well accommodated in the clothing industry?

When I came out of the dressing room to return my stack of ill-fitting jeans to the rack, I surveyed the store. With the exception of one woman who looked like a super model and didn't have a butt, hips, thighs, boobs, or anything that jiggled anywhere, every other women in the store had something in stock in the trunk department. So why are clothing companies making jeans for the buttless women, and leaving the rest of us to walk around with plumbers butt, or massive gaps at the waist band, or jeans that push body parts to places they don't belong? If I didn't get so horribly frustrated every time I try on clothes, I might actually buy some. Accommodating butts seems like good business sense to me.

Suggestions on where to shop are very very very welcome.