In Westchester County, an affluent address just north of New York City, spring has sprung. Irvington, once one of a string of Lower Hudson Valley armpit towns, and the long-ago home of Washington Irving — he of Sleepy Hollow, Headless Horseman fame — is alive with pleasure. Pleasure greater, even, than that of a Newport cigarette.

It is Saturday, and I am taking my wife shopping at Eileen Fisher. I am at peace and reminded of that lovely song by the Decemberists, “June Hymn.” When I say “at peace” it’s a relative term, for I am forever fomenting. The brown river water laps the Irvington shore. I lean over the rusted metal Hudson River railing and spy the George Washington Bridge to the south. To the north, that jazzy new Tappan Zee just upriver. The latter is now called the Mario Cuomo Bridge, but fuck that. I don’t call the Interboro Expressway the Jackie and I don’t refer to the Triboro Bridge as the RFK, either. Some might beg to differ, but I think of myself as a traditionalist blessed with timeless values.

Much like the fashion of Eileen Fisher.

At tonight’s the Met Gala, I daresay no boldfaced name will say “Eileen Fisher” when asked “So…who are you wearing?” The House of Fisher began back in the 80s, when Eileen started her little company in the Village with a few hundred bucks in the bank and a smattering of SKUs. Today, Eileen Fisher’s company is an international power brand with northward of $800 million in annual turnover.

That’s a whole lotta linen.

Saturday, eleven o’clock, and the parking lot down by the riverside is packed with Volvo plug-in hybrids, for this is a sustainability-driven clientele. No wonder Eileen Fisher headquarters and store are here. No wonder the company rebranded their “used clothing” (such a declasse term!) program. It is called “Renew”. These pieces, according to the company website, are “Gently Worn Clothes — Wardrobe staples you’ll reach for again and again. In fabrics that stand the test of time.”

There’s a lotta money in that used white crepe.

The 5,000 pound, $70,000 Volvo SUVs — four-wheel drive behemoths rivalling size of the Conestoga wagons that once crossed the prairies — are parked. The closest these tanks get to going off-road is the gravel parking lot of the Amagansett farmer’s market, but I digress.

Vehicle occupants flit to the store’s front door like iron filings magnetically drawn by the allure of sustainably crafted Tencel twill pants suits. Tencel is derived from the cellulose of wood pulp, sourced from (what else?) sustainably harvested Eucalyptus trees.

The apparel is attractive, well-crafted, easily mixed-and-matched, ridiculously expensive, and safe. You can’t go wrong, for every piece goes with every other piece, snapped together like linen Legos.

I see a featured outfit, a very tailored hounds tooth suit that Tea Leoni, in her “Madame Secretary” role, might wear to a particularly important parent-teacher conference.

The shoppers are lighthearted and in full spending-spree modality, for it is spring, the sun is abundantly warm, and post-purchasing lunch awaits. Perhaps they’ll frequent the upscale Greek joint next door, MP Taverna (which started as a high-zoot Astoria souvlaki-teria), or the Red Hat bistro (cucumber and fennel martini, anyone?) where bread and butter is served upon request.

There is a frenzy of activity and dressing rooms are filled with frocks. As we approach lunchtime, credit cards are proffered and the crowd thins. Unwanted apparel is removed from the dressing rooms and re-racked by the store’s skilled, patient, and professional sales staff. These people work hard, and know how to do retail. That, in itself, is refreshing in an era of clerks who seemingly only know this disdainful response: “No, we don’t have that in stock.”

The good news for me is that store management intelligently includes overstuffed seating near the dressing rooms, so the shoppers’ guests can relax comfortably and provide expert, thumbs-up/thumbs-down advice.

My wife looks amazing in every piece she tries on. It’s a thumbs-up kind of day.

Outside again, the sun is strong. We load our Subaru wagon with sustainable bounty. The sky is still blue and I am still reasonably at peace. I look down-River, then up-River one last time. A few boats bob on the calm waters of the lower Hudson River.

And I think: there are worse things in the world than being the anti-Fiurucci. To paraphrase Elvis Costello, what’s so funny about “simplicity, sustainability, and timeless design.”

And what do I know, anyway? I get my clothes online from Cabela’s Bargain Cave. “Tonight, Marty is wearing Carhartt. Stunning cargo pants, Marty. Tell us about it, won’t you?”

I drive out of the parking lot, past the Metro North train station, and head back to the Bronx. And as I do, as the sun causes me to reach for my sunglasses for the first time this season, I think of this verse from the Decemberists’ song, “June Hymn”:

“A barany of ivy in the trees, expanding out it’s empire by degrees. And all the branches burst a’ bloom, into bloom. Heaven sent this cardinal, maroon.” And, then, that chorus:
“And once upon it, the yellow bonnets, Garland all the line. And you were waking, and day was breaking, a panoply of song. And summer comes to Springville Hills.”

For a Saturday of clothes shopping, it could have been way worse.