Current view. Somebody is glad I'm home.
I've had a decent night's sleep and am feeling . . . eh. The Texas Daughter messaged me yesterday that she had gone to the doctor because she thought she had allergies, and it turned out that she had a massive strep infection instead.
"Your tonsils are so swollen I'm not even going to swab you," the doctor said.
She said to me, "I just thought the heat was making me tired and stuff, but apparently I've been sick."
So now I wonder whether this persistent scratchy throat and headache, which I've been dosing with Zyrtec and trying to manage with sleep and vitamins, is not actually something more than normal allergies. Do I wonder enough to take myself to the doctor? Film at eleven.
I got up this morning and pecked away a little at this novel project, where I'm just spinning out scenes, picking up with different characters at random to think about the world through their consciousness, so that eventually --- I hope --- something will begin to take shape out of all the randomness. Having read from the novel the other night makes me itch to have another novel coming out, so that I'll keep getting invited places to read to people. That's what I told the audience, in fact, when I took the podium: "I loved reading aloud to my children. I love reading to people. So now I'm going to read to you."
Not much going on otherwise. The Boyfriend leaves today, which is sad, because he's been nice to have around. I suspect the Artgirl will be really sad. Meanwhile, the Viking Son is enjoying, I guess, his last day as an underage drinker --- not that he drinks much, but in Europe he could (so could the Artgirl), and it's been a bit of a drag to come back here and not be able to pop out for a beer unless his parents buy it for him. Anyway, he turns 21 tomorrow, which seems huge: my little boy.
This will always and forever be my favorite picture of him, fifteen years ago, in the creek at Julian Price Park, along the Blue Ridge Parkway above Blowing Rock. It was October, a perfect golden day. And here he is, just being. To this day, he still is, intensely. And we love him. More photos tomorrow, probably, because turning 21 is a big freaking deal, and not only because you can buy your own beer.
Meanwhile, I did get dressed. I picked up the first dress my eye fell upon, tossed on the drying rack by the bedroom window, and that dress was . . .
Audrey! Currently the frontrunner in the July-wearing race with FOUR, count 'em, FOUR wears in the first half of the month. Of course, it's only half over, so we'll see who wins in the end, but I knew I'd reach for Audrey a lot in the summer, and I am gratified to have been right about that. I've foregone the crop top today, though I am wearing my Pact bralette-crop underneath. It's nice to put on a long, flowy dress with bare shoulders for breeziness. Though the fabric is heavier than that of most of my other dresses (barring Sierra), it's still such a nice summer weight.
Looking . . . what's the word I want? A lot more something than I actually feel.
Hair up in a claw-clip updo, which might become my default for the rest of the summer.
It's about the only really reliable updo I can manage and has been my go-to for more than twenty years: braid hair, fold braid up and over on itself to hide ends, secure with clip. I used to have an enormous barrette that would hold all my hair (not many barrettes will), but even that one broke at last, and ever since, I've been struggling to find something that works. What does seem to work are these smaller clips with really long teeth. I don't know what you call them --- there is probably a special name. They aren't octupus clips. Jaw clips, maybe? Anyway, they have long teeth, which means they reach around enough hair to be useful to me. I also bought a set of metal claw clips the other day in Walgreens: three smaller and one larger. The smaller ones actually work to hold my hair in a half-updo. The larger one will hold this kind of updo. I wish they were silver instead of gold, but I really like them anyway, because they work. Since I don't really want to cut my hair, it's helpful to have reliable defaults for putting it up when it's not working on the loose so much. I do a lot of ponytails, but those start to get old.
I could move this whole updo up the back of my head some, and smooth it out, to make it more graceful and sophisticated. But it'll do for now. In the dog days of summer, at any rate, it's good to wear my hair off my neck and out of the way.
Speaking of dog days, here's Dora right now, asleep with her head on the table.
That's pretty much how I feel. But on with the day.
LATER:
I'm bored but have no creative energy, so decided to organize my sweater shelf. I've had this impression that my sweater collection was huge --- and maybe by some metrics it is --- but I didn't know how many sweaters I actually have. So I decided to sort and count them. Here's the tally:
Pullover sweaters:
I have 3. One cotton ragg-knit blue one, one merino/mohair/lyocell/cotton-blend green one (the staple of my Norway travel capsule), and one cotton-ramie pinkish one.
Cardigans:
2 gray: one cashmere and silk (the beaded one), one viscose, which is becoming rather pilled. I keep debating donating the viscose one, because it is in less great shape, and it's also not a natural fiber. But it's a nice cardigan that I've worn a lot, especially as a transitional-weather piece, so I'm not sure I'm ready to get rid of it.
2 purple: one 100% cotton (the cable-knit one), the other 100% merino. Both keepers for the coming seasons.
2 teal: one alpaca (the lighter, bluer one), one cashmere.
3 blue: one navy linen-blend duster, one periwinkle (which could count as purple, really) in a 100% cotton crochet, one cobalt blue in 100% merino.
And the rest: one 100% cotton green, one linen-blend champagne-colored duster (twin to the navy-blue one), one redyed cranberry-red 100% cotton.
So:
3 pullovers
12 cardigans
That's a total of (here's some easy math!) 15 sweater layers. It occurs to me that every single one of them came to me secondhand. Most of them I've had for many years. All of them are pieces I wear fairly regularly, given the season.
So . . . my wardrobe way exceeds the 33-piece minimalist ideal, but then that was never my ideal, as I don't seem to tire of insisting. My own ideal, truly, is to own only clothes that I wear, and clothes that I like to wear. That's what earns its share of my closet real estate.
And I think I'm realizing that ideal. Now, I could add to my sweaters. I still would really like a rose-pink sweater --- like a darker rose, not pale --- in either cardigan or pullover form. I still would like some kind of cropped heavy Aran-type sweater, maybe in an oatmeal or other off-white. Those are things I think I would wear and enjoy, but they are hardly emergencies. I have enough to make outfits every day, and then some. We're way past need territory and into nice to have.
Some of my cardigans are showing their ages, too. That bright green-teal cardigan came to me with holes, which I mended, and is becoming a bit pilled. I could envision replacing it, not necessarily with something in the same color, but with something that would go in the slot that it might vacate. And I could see moving the gray Athleta viscose cardigan along, too, for much the same reason. I like it and have worn it a lot, but it's starting to look past its sell-by date. The emerald-green cotton cardigan, too, is looking a bit faded and pilly. Cotton tends not to hold its shape so well. AND the crocheted periwinkle cardigan, which I love, has developed some extra holes, though they don't show much because of the open pattern.
Anyway, as I've said, I'm on a purchasing pause until November, but when my pause is lifted, I might keep an eye out for cardigans that would induce me to let go of some of these older ones that are looking less marvelous than they used to. I keep and mend things, but part of not looking past my own sell-by date is wearing things that aren't past theirs. As you get older, I think you just have less margin for wearing stretched-out, or faded, or pilled items --- you can have whatever style you want, and a lot of license to be eccentric, but you just have less space for getting away with clothes that look old, because then you look old, and not in a good way. You look like the kind of old person who has ceased to care, which is a way of communicating that you think you're no longer of value: too old to merit nice clothes. That's the message, which I think you send as much to yourself as to the world at large --- and it's not the message you want to send to either of those recipients. At least, it's not the message I want to send. So as attached as I am to some of these cardigans, I think it's important for me to evaluate them and make decisions about them, and to give myself permission to replace them as I find I need to.
That's been my endeavor of the afternoon, at any rate, and these are the conclusions I've drawn from it. Now I need to cause an old weight bench to be carried to the curb, because the Viking Son is sick of having it clutter up his room. Happy birthday, son --- we're throwing out the weight bench.
PS: I think I've talked myself into going ahead and moving some of those cardigans to the outbox. Not the crocheted one, which I still really enjoy wearing, but anything pilled or faded or stretched out. So in a flash, I go from 12 cardigans to 9, and to 12 sweaters overall. Let's see if I miss the emerald cotton one, the gray Athleta, and the much-mended teal cashmere . . . possibly, if Marly comes to North Carolina in the fall, we can hit the wonderful chichi Highlands thrift store again, and I can buy some more secondhand cashmere or alpaca . . .
Sweater shelf revision:
They're all easily accessible and visible, too --- no big piles where something gets pushed to the back and forgotten. Visibility is everything.
Having fewer for the time being --- well, I don't wear that many of them that much at this time of year, but having fewer will, over the course of the seasons, mean that I do wear what I have. I also want to remember to reach for jackets, and for scarves and shawls, as alternative outer layers in situations where I want one.
Have what you'll wear; wear what you have. That seems like a good rule.