Remembering A Quick Trip to La Secunda and a Green Suit

Copying our Chicano parents' 1940's style into the '60s

                                                                             

Even cassettes still available at la secunda
   
  

      As a kid, I remember my grandmother and Spanish-speaking Mexican relatives calling it, “La Secunda.” My Mexican American/Chicano parents celled it, the Second-hand, Thrift, or Used Clothing Store, even though it carried more than just clothes. I remembered this, out of the blue, during one of my morning cruises when I passed no less than four thrift stores in about a five-mile radius on L.A.'s tony westside. That’s more establishments than Mc Donalds’, Burger King, or even Pollo Loco.

     I’ve been going to thrift stores since the 1970s, when my generation didn’t want to get caught wearing anything new or trendy, rebelling against the establishment's department stores. Teenagers and young adults, rich and poor alike, dressed like laborers, farmers, and grannies. We went for faded jeans, sailors' bellbottoms, t-shirts, tank tops, worn Pendletons, army or jean jackets, cowboy or work boots, stuff like that, pretending we were “all country,” even in the suburbs. Of course, most Chicanos weren't pretending. That was us, donning our parents' garb onto college campuses.

     The secunda carried plenty of that, including furniture, books and records, at the lowest prices. That it was all “truly” used didn’t make any difference. Once you washed the clothes, they were good as new. A 1960s-70s apartment, for instance, wouldn’t have the newest furniture or consoles from Sears or Montgomery Ward, like our parents’ generation.

     We recycled milk cartons, cinder blocks, and pine planks for end tables or wall and book shelves. We liked sitting on old, comfortable sofas, large pillows tossed on a rug, and rattan chairs purchased at Pier 1, Imports, like we were in an exotic environment, potted plants in woven macrame everywhere.

     Of course, all that changed when we got real jobs, married, and started having kids. Me? I hung on to the old ways into the 80s. Today, I still go into thrift stores. I recently picked up a pair of JBL book-shelf speakers, perfect sound. Seems like everybody is getting rid of their stodgy stereos and big-ass speakers and streaming music through devices smaller than a tissue box. A lot of thrift stores are filled with quality stereo equipment.

    That got me to thinking about the time I landed a position of dean at a local community college. I’d already paid my dues, working in administration at two UC’s and a state university, as well as five-years of teaching. My go-to clothes were beige khaki’s, polo shirts or powder blue dress shirts, tie, and dark blue blazer.

    So, I was hanging out with a friend, a painter by trade. I’d done my time with manual labor in my youth, before I finished my university degrees. We were talking and watching a game on television. Who knows what game, depending what was in season. I told him I had to go to Washinton D.C. for a conference and to visit legislators who sat on the Higher Education Committees, to twist their arms about letting loose of more funding for colleges and universities. I told him I needed to go buy a suit. A blue blazer, tie, and kakis wouldn’t cut it.

     I asked if he wanted to go with me, to keep me company. He agreed. We hopped into my car and headed out. He asked where we were going. I retorted, “La secunda.” He burst out laughing. I told him why spend hundreds of dollars on a suit when I’d only wear it once, maybe twice. I hated suits. I wasn’t in the Willie Brown, Antonio Villaraigosa camp, wearing form-fitting custom-made Italian suits. It wasn’t even about the money. If I wanted, I could spring for a $1,000 suit, but it went against my values. He listened, chuckling the whole time, thinking I was jostling him. “Come on, really, where are we going,” he asked, “Nordstrom, Macy’s?”

     He thought I was taking the joke too far when I pulled into a thrift store parking lot on Santa Monica Boulevard, in West L.A., near where he went to high school. When I stepped out of the car, he stayed put. “Alright, I get it,” he said, or something to that effect. “You can stop with the joke.”

     “No joke. They’ve got everything here, even suits.”

     Reluctantly, he followed me into the store, suspicious, not wanting to get caught up in my teasing, the butt of my joke, like waiting for me to say, “Ah! Got you.”

     Once you get past the musty smell in the clothes area, they really do have some nice clothes. I even saw a few Mercedes, Lexus, and BMWs in the parking lot, hip shoppers coming down from Brentwood to find bargains on named brands.

     Each time I pulled a suit from the rack, he kept his eyes peeled, waiting for me to pull the trigger, to catch him in my trap. It didn’t take but fifteen minutes for me to find a dark green suit, made in New York, a brand I knew carried some weight. “I’m going to try this on,” I told him.

     I found a changing room, and, even to my surprise, it fit perfectly, pant waist and length, like it had been waiting for me. I came outside and stood in front of the mirror. “What do you think?”

     I cocked an eye, afraid to commit. Eventually, he said, “Looks good, actually.”

     “Yeah, right. I’m taking it.”

     I showed him the price tag hanging from one sleeve, $12.00. “How can you beat that?” I said, more of a statement than a question.

     He shook his head, still not getting himself to believe what he was witnessing, like I was about to say, “Fake! Let’s get out of here and go to a real suit store.”

     I walked to the cash register and placed the suit on the counter. I took out a twenty-dollar-bill. The woman at the register said, “Ah, you’re lucky day. It’s on sale, fifty percent off." She folded the coat and trousers and put them into a plastic bag. She gave me back fourteen dollars. We made a quick exit to the parking lot, passing people entering the store, and got into my car. On the drive home, my friend kept shaking his head, not sure what to believe, that I'd drop six bucks on a joke and still go to a real suit store, that I was cheap, and lucky.

     I wore the suit to D.C., met with legislators and toured the capitol, attended a conference, lunches, and dinners, proud as punch in my snazzy dark green suit, looking like it had been tailor made, not one other suit in the bunch “out-suiting” me. I even got a couple of compliments.

     It stayed in my closet for years. I never had the need to wear it again, as I switched back to khakis, powder blue shirts, and dark blue blazers. Somewhere along the line, I guess I took it back to la secunda, to give someone else a shot at wearing it.