A Question of Pants

Earlier today, I dropped off two pairs of pants to be shipped back. They had been ordered online but did not fit, so they were being shipped back in exchange for pants of the same make, but slightly larger around the waist. While these pants were taken care of, there are others that still trouble me.

I have an old pair of pants, and I don't know how to get rid of them. I want to get rid of them, as they are in the process of falling apart. One leg has a hole worn away on the inner thigh, while the other leg is developing a hole to match its partner. There is also a hole developing on the right leg, between the knee and pelvis; it is threadbare, and with some more wearing down, will be worn through completely.

For point of reference, there was this one time I wore these pants to the bank, and the teller behind the counter frowned at me. I'm pretty sure it was the pants. And they've only gotten worse since then.

I don't want to just throw the pants away, aiding in the loading up of some landfill, but I'm not sure how to dispose of them. Repairing them is no longer an option; the damage is beyond a simple stitch, and while a patch might fix this, the returns are diminishing. I cannot reasonably pass them along to a family member without drawing their ire and having spent time volunteering at a thrift store in the past, I cannot bring myself to give them a garment that they would surely reject given the chance to do so.

A similar problem, though one of greater proportions are the old shoes. We have about a dozen pairs of shoes sitting on the back steps, collecting dust. For the most part, they are too small to be worn by anyone here, and in a few cases, some of the individual shoes are falling apart. There's one pair that I wear when doing gardening work, as they fit and are in poor enough shape already that they can't get much worse while still being functional. But for so many of the others, well, it has been years since they have graced anyone's feet. At the same time, most of them are worn out to the point that they would be considered unacceptable as a donation.

And so the problem remains. The obvious solution seems fiercely irresponsible, the do-nothing course of action won't solve anything (and will probably just make things worse, given enough time), and the charitable move would (most likely) upset other people. What to do? Try something else, perhaps. Now if only I could figure out what.