Morning kitchen scene. I'm just having a second cup of coffee before venturing out with Dora for our morning walk. Music stacked on the table because I got asked at the last minute to cantor the Confirmation Mass in our parish tonight --- with no organ, because the organist/one-woman music program is sick. I'm afraid the bulletins for the service are already made up, which is kind of a pain because I'd rather just sing chant than sing hymns by myself a capella, which maybe two people in the congregation will sing along with. Going to go early to talk to Father about it all, but man, if I could ditch the hymns and just spool out endless verses of chant, that would sure be nice. Fiat, however.
I slept once again in the purple bamboo dress and am wearing it now for coffee and dog-walking.
Once I come back from our walk, I'll change into my blue Camellia wool dress from yesterday and walk up to the square to meet a Twitter friend for lunch. Then home to go over music again and try to limber up my voice, then to the church at 5. That's the day.
I've been trying, with limited success, not to track the progress of my two packages --- my Wool& Maggie dress and my Xero Cassie shoes --- as they cross the continent. Tracking numbers are a good idea in lots of ways, but it sure is easy to hyperfocus on the peregrinations of something you've paid for and then want to show up instantly on your doorstep. I have to remind myself: it's not like I don't have anything to wear. The tracking numbers are showing that the dress will arrive on Monday, the shoes on Tuesday. I'd hoped I might have the dress, if not the shoes, to wear to Mass on Sunday, but it's okay if I don't, truly. Patience, patience. I will have both to take to the beach with me if I want, though I doubt I'll take the shoes, because they'd just get all sandy.
POST-WALK:
I came back, talked to my mother on the phone, and changed clothes:
This is a variation on yesterday's outfit: the same blue Wool& Camellia, belted, but with a thin white belt this time, not the braided leather belt I usually reach for. I like this dress belted quite a lot. The white belt offers some contrast --- almost more contrast than I'm easy with --- but it's thin and doesn't call attention to itself too much. One of Nat Tucker's principles is that a belt shouldn't be wider than your thumb, or maybe two fingers at most (I'm paraphrasing from memory, but you can watch the linked short video), and this makes a lot of sense to me: you want your belt, of all things, not to announce itself as the major component of what you're wearing. It's there as an accent, not as a centerpiece. My personal exception would be a scarf tied as a belt, because obviously that's going to be wider, and I wouldn't not use a scarf as a belt, but in general, I think it's a good rule, maybe especially if you're a smaller person. I like things fairly simple and understated anyway.
I'm wearing my belt a little tighter and higher on my torso today, which feels right --- and I think does work for the Rule of Thirds. I've made my waistline higher and shorter, the bottom of my outfit longer. I probably won't bother with a cardigan, because I won't be in air conditioning much, but I could add one for a vertical line to break up the horizontal line and trouble the proportion further, to good effect. As it is, l like the simplicity of this basic outfit.
So, the white belt, and today, the Xero Colorados again, for a dark frame to the outfit. I don't have any white shoes, as it happens, but even if I did, I wouldn't want to wear them with this white belt: boringly matchy, but also drawing the eye to two different places in a competing way. The beholder doesn't know where exactly to look, because two different elements are saying, with equal loudness, "Look at me!" Charcoal-gray shoes which will be good to walk in, up to the square for lunch and maybe around the square after, as well as a cool, temperature-regulating dress that looks nice but is also comfortable for the weather.
Tonight, to cantor, I'll probably wear my charcoal Sierra (the church is always freezingly air-conditioned), a gray cardigan, and a scarf with some red in it.
Or the scarf as a shawl for my shoulders . . . something like this ensemble:
Gray on gray, with a touch of red in the scarf/shawl. If I like this, I'll wear it for Pentecost, too.