Star of Bethlehem, a beautiful tiny spring bulb naturalized all through our lawn, which I learned the hard way years ago not to pick and bring inside. Dog Farts in a Vase is pretty much the ambient smell you get when you do that. Today I am enjoying them outdoors, from a respectful distance, though they don't really smell so bad in the open air. I just love the effect of them strewn all through the lawn, with violets, dandelions, and camellia petals.
Here's a view of the container garden today, with mangled dog toy, looking toward the house:
I'm glad I put daffodil bulbs in so many of these containers, though I'm going to dig them up and transplant them once they're done. They are making a lovely show now. I still need to acquire some more of these 20-gallon grow bags, so that the garden can accommodate both vegetables and flowers in the summer. I want to sow things like zinnias and cosmos in some containers, and intersperse those with tomatoes, peppers, etc. I think I'll probably make room for herbs around the stump, since herbs mostly don't care about soil quality, and in fact do better when it's poor -- right now I have some lamb's ear growing in one section, but I think I'm going to move it and put something like lavender in its place. I already have thyme growing in that garden, and sage, chives, and basil started from seed. I have some oregano that I could move. I think a nice, bushy herb garden right there would be a good thing, with some more drought-resistant flowers in the containers on the stump. Last year I had portulaca, which did really well until the first hard freeze.
Anyway, things to think about. I would like to finish fencing this garden, too. Though so far Dora hasn't destroyed anything in it, it would be nice to keep her out. I could see her deciding to wallow in the strawberry-bed container once we get it moved in, and it would be nice if she did not.
Wearing today -- again going for things I haven't worn often, or in a long time:
SHORTS. I own exactly one pair of shorts that aren't bike shorts meant to be worn under dresses, and these are they. They are Gap, a nice heavy twill. I bought three pairs at various thrift stores last year, and these are the only ones I've wound up keeping. I like the length and cut, and I adore the color, that fresh sagey spring green. They are a basic, masculine cut, which means that they look best with more feminine elements -- otherwise I just look boxy and blah. This embroidered scoop-neck navy knit top, which I bought new but have owned for probably close to ten years now, is a perfect complement to the utilitarian look of the shorts. I'm not a really romantic, fluffy, floofy, ruffly kind of person, but I adore tender feminine details like the stitching on this top --
-- and the tiny ruffled detail in the neckline of my cardigan.
The shorts are so plain that they make a nice backdrop for the mix of patterns and textures: the embroidery in the top, the cable knit of the cardigan.
It's warm enough that I'll probably be taking the cardigan off, so I went with my purple Oswegos again to make sure I kept some Lenten color in my scheme.
Wet hair, plus some mother-of-pearl earrings my kids gave me for my birthday a couple of years ago:
Anyway, I don't wear shorts all that often, but it's nice to remember that I have them and can wear them. After yesterday's very short dress, they feel quite modest . . .
In addition to Nat Tucker and her Make It Look Easy program, I'm also on the mailing list for another stylist, Elyse Holladay, whose ideas I like and find translatable to my own life. She has a paid program which, not surprisingly, I haven't joined, but I do want to watch this video, which I'm linking here at least partly so that I can find it again. The link to the video was part of today's email newsletter, which explores, or encourages us to explore, the mindsets behind the kinds of self-talk we engage in about clothes.
For example: if we're saying, Oh, that looks so good on you, but I could never wear it, are we in fact saying something about how we view our body -- that we dislike it and couldn't bear to display it in the same way as the other person? Now, I'll qualify this by saying that that particular mindset doesn't have to be the reason why you admire something on somebody else but know you couldn't wear it yourself. You can admire a color or shape on another person, knowing full well that the color or shape doesn't work with your own coloring or body type. In other words, you don't have to be engaging in negative self-talk; you can be simply realistic about yourself, which is okay. On the other hand, maybe what you'd be more inclined to say, or at least mean, in that situation would be: That looks so good on you, but I would never wear it. I can see where you'd have to be careful -- I would never wear that could sound like a judgment. But it can still be what you mean: that you genuinely admire the other person's look while acknowledging that it isn't your own. Still, I know that what Elyse is going for is the negative self-talk, and she's right to encourage people to examine what we're really saying to ourselves, about ourselves, in moments like that.
I know that this was me for way too long:
I don’t know… I’m just not sure if I should spend the money on this dress...
Maybe we’re saying… I don’t trust myself to make purchases that I won’t regret later. I don’t know my style well enough to confidently say yes (or no) to this. I’m not sure I deserve nice things. I feel guilty for buying clothes right now. Will I be a bad person if I buy from a “bad” brand? Can someone just give me permission?
All of this seems very familiar to me, though I think I've gotten better at it, mostly because I have largely clarified for myself what looks and feels good to me. It's fairly easy to look at an item of clothing and go, nope. It's harder to determine a yes, among a number of good options when I can't buy them all. BUT the field is usually smaller because I can exclude colors, shapes, fabrics, as definitely not what I want.
Meanwhile, I have been wrangling with this one a little:
I need a new outfit for this event and I only have a few days to get something and I'm freaking out!
Maybe we’re saying… I don’t feel good about what I have already, none of those things feel like me. I love my style but I don’t know if I can show up as myself to this event. I’m nervous about it and buying something new is under my control.
This because I do have events coming up, like my high-school reunion, though I have more than a few days in which to make any kind of decision. Of course, I've already decided on a no-buy year, which helps me a great deal with clarity. My default setting is: wear what I have. Still, I wrestle with some of the same basic anxiety here. It's not so much that I don't feel good about what I have, or that it doesn't feel like me. If anything, it feels so much like me that I'm afraid I'm going to show up like a visitor from another planet, and that I'm going to be the one who feels weird and self-conscious, even though I know perfectly well that what other people are likely to be wearing isn't me at all.In other news, here's a poem by Wilfred Owen, born on this day in 1893.