It's funny, saucy and a similar exercise to what we're doing here, only they are focusing on not bringing more stuff in rather than getting rid of stuff.
I've definitely found myself facing a business meeting, a conference, etc. with the thought that I don't have anything suitable to wear. This is one of those points of distress, where running out to buy something creates a form of escape. (As Randy Frost calls it in Stuff: Compulsive Hoarding and the Meaning of Things
As it turns out -- and this is also a teaching and learning of meditation -- escape does not create solutions.
Alternately, though, I've been questioning the thought, "I don't have anything suitable to wear," by asking "Is this true?" And then looking in my closet. I actually have more to wear than I need.
Duh.
I can relate to this totally. I have not bought new clothing, other than replacing Levis or another basic item that has become stained beyond even gardening use, in years. You heard me--years! I have a collection of clothing that is 75% vintage, which has become my style in a way that does not mean fashion--it means comfort and living in what amuses or delights or has memories for me, that I love surrounding myself in. A friend recently offered her boys' outgrown pants, and I accepted. Not because "I'm just a girl who can't say no"--but because I will wear them in the fall and winter and look like I stepped out of Abercrombie & Fitch. Well, maybe :) The point is--I feel perfectly fine with my current wardrobe. If I were invited to a wedding tomorrow, I'd have the perfect get-up. Or funeral--tons of black in my closet! I never had to report to an office, and being an artist grants me a lot of leeway. But since I consider dress a form of expression, and I AM an assemblage artist with a dash of Betty & Veronica, I figure I'm good to go for quite a while. It looks like I've passed the "will she gain weight or not" point too, in the hormone/aging thing. I seem to be taking after my Nana--for which I am grateful! I weigh less than I did in high school, and have been holding steady for 3 decades past the eating disorder years. I've discovered that my diet, like my wardrobe, tend to settle into their own healthy equilibrium that may need tweaked by an outside source from time to time, but basically, pass the brownie, let me sit in the sun for 15 minutes wearing my vintage halter top sundress with matching Bass Outlet gold ballet slippers. (OK--my shoes are all from the nearby Bass Outlet, but I wear them to death! then replace with the same thing). If and when I do buy a new "frock" or winter coat, I know it will come with a feeling of appreciation that I have rediscovered in the past decade. When shopping was just something I did out of habit or boredom or default setting for whatever ailed me, it completely robbed me of the kind of joy that now comes with the act of doing something I used to do, and having a completely set of feelings and frame of reference that humbles me and puts things into what feel like a proper perspective. Frugality and simplicity are steppingstones for discovering what really matters. At least, that's what I think. And it is a learning by doing philosophy.
ReplyDeleteI couldn't say it better. It's funny, because when we were growing up, it was pretty normal to have homemade clothes -- and I got into a group in high school where being able to do this well was considered cool, and not really in a nerdy way. I've sewed clothes a few times in my adult life, for special occasions...and what I've found in more recent years is that it can be a) more expensive than buying something, and b) other than my own labor, usually not a Made In the USA kind of experience, since much of our textile production now happens offshore. So it is not green or sustainable, in so many ways, from the concerns about working conditions, to how chemicals used in the process are handled, to the fuel it takes to get things here. Sigh.
ReplyDeleteHere's a related blog from a project you may already know about, the Brown Dress project: an artist who made a brown dress and wore it every day for a year:
http://www.littlebrowndress.com/default.asp
(In the meantime, I have a very cute vintage cocktail dress that would probably fit you, and look great on you, too...)
And here's another! (I'm getting inspired...to start to clear out my closet, a "graduate-level" activity.)
ReplyDeletehttp://theuniformproject.com/
These links are new to me~ will check them out! I bought fabric at a warehouse sale about a year and a half ago, still waiting for me to sew my own dress...something I always did in HS, like you. Tho in my era, it wasn't so much acknowledged as cool (all the girls with $ were wearing Villager & Ladybug dresses) it was the dawning of a new (hippie) era and I straddled the Eisenhower years into that time courtesy of Cher's influence! I sewed my second pair of bellbottoms (the first were unfortunate department store-bought navy corduroy), and from then on I was in creative sewing heaven!
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