My front walk a couple of weeks ago. Right now it's a rain-bedraggled mess. We had more storms move through late yesterday afternoon, to batter things further that had already been beaten down by much rain. Not much remains of the peonies at this point, but that's the way of peonies: glorious and ephemeral, like everything else in this world.
Work to do today, pub night tonight --- in Blowing Rock, I think, for a change. I've been having a yen for the Alehouse, even if we don't preface it with a hike.
The sun's out for a hot minute ---
--- and the high today is supposed to be something like 80F, quite pleasant. It'll be cooler in the mountains tonight, so I might go ahead and retrieve my woolens from deep-freeze quarantine, where they've been since Saturday. Looking, meanwhile, at what I haven't worn in the last two weeks . . . because as we all know by now, the theme here is Wear the Closet.
Speaking of, I've gone spelunking in the Poshmark-closet basket again. I was looking at some white-on-white (or pale-on-pale) ensembles and lamenting that I didn't have a white shirt . . . and then I remembered that I do, only I've been trying to sell it.
This isn't a great photo --- I've since rinsed it out and hung it, to get rid of the wrinkles. But yeah, I think I might try keeping this blouse. It's not ideal: rayon with polyester lace. I bought it at Goodwill four or five years ago, though, so anything I do with it just represents another stage of recycling. It's been for sale in my Poshmark closet for a year with no nibbles, and rather than trying to get rid of it in some other way, the sustainable thing to do, it seems, is to hang onto it and wear it some. It needs a camisole or slip under it, but I have a white bamboo slip that will suffice when I wear it with skirts, which is mostly what I'd do. If I wanted to wear it with a pair of linen trousers, I'd have to think about what to wear under it. That's one reason why I wasn't wearing it much to begin with, but my aesthetic has shifted a little, and I think I'm motivated to find, and can find, solutions.
Eventually, if I don't re-list it on Poshmark for a lower price, I might pass it along to the Texasgirl, whom I think it would fit and flatter. Meanwhile, if I'm thinking white-on-off-white outfits . . . well, here is my solution. And it is a really pretty blouse. Not my natural-fiber ideal, but a pretty blouse that deserves some wear.
Today, though, it's drying on a hanger. I'm thinking I might re-debut it on Sunday, for Pentecost, with my red skirt --- or with my off-white linen skirt and red shoes. That could be fun. Either of those would be a nice outfit. A little cottagecore-LARPy, maybe, but still nice.
Wearing today:
*Secondhand Not Perfect Linen Smock dress (S/M) in Dark Gray Blue (I think), bought December 2023
*Very old thrifted J.Jill ramie (maybe a blend; I'd have to check the label) sweater
*Secondhand Birk Mayaris, bought April 2024
I've hung onto this boxy little sweater a long time, mostly because I love the color, but also because it's the perfect very-lightweight top layer for a warm morning when the house still feels a little chilly.
But yeah, mostly I love the color because I feel good in it, even when I'm all old-lady/don't-give-me-that-business-face.
Yesterday's hair in a claw-clip half-updo today:
You can see here how much curlier the front is than the back, the top layers than the underlayers. You can also see how much silver is in the process of growing in. I'd be tempted to think that I was damaging my hair somehow, that those short hairs were broken ones springing up, but they're all silver, so I think they're all just new. And I love it. I'm here for it.
As vain as I am, this is just one more thing to be vain about, the beautiful glinty silver. Having had the exact same brown hair my entire life, I'm interested in the change of color, and in the whole process. In my observation, too, no woman who has grown her dye job out looked better before. I have friends with silver hair who've never colored their hair, but when I see photos of their younger selves, with dark hair, I always think, Yeah, you looked nice then, but you're actually stunning now. Many such cases, as they say.
I'm not about to fault anybody for taking whatever anti-aging measures, because the one body I live in is this one, not somebody else's. But I am going to be defiant in my own refusal to do any of those things. If you do do them, that's not a comment on you. But it is a pushback against a culture that in various ways views older people as throwaways (OK, Boomer. OK, Karen), and is happy, in many places, to offer them death as an alternative to sucking up the medical and other resources.
AND it's a pushback against a culture that has always seen older women as invisible, non-sexual, unattractive, past it --- that uses adjectives like shopworn for a forty-year-old woman (Virginia Madsen in that movie with Paul Giamatti about twenty years ago . . . I forget the name of the movie, but I'll never forget the review that described her as shopworn). The only way to be attractive is to LARP as a person whom time does not touch? Screw that. I realize that that's easy for me to say. I can be flippant about the male gaze, because I have the gaze of the male whose gaze I care about. Somebody does want me. He wanted me when I was 25 and refused to wear makeup. He wants me when I'm almost 60 and still refuse (although I do have some tinted lip gloss, like an 8th grader).
It's a lot harder to be flippant about the male gaze when you don't actually have that assurance --- I know that. But somebody has to say that it's okay to be a person caught in time, that time does not make you unlovable or undesirable, that the normal fallen body, scarred and stretch-marked and wrinkled and crumpled and sagging, is beautiful and miraculous at every moment of its being, and that to find it so is what love is.
The hardest project, of course, is to love yourself. Somebody else can love you, and you can still not be convinced. But sometimes you find yourself alone, and then really, if somebody is going to love you (after God --- that's my first assumption, that that love always is present to you), that somebody has to be you. You have to find things to love about yourself: today, not someday; as you are now, not as you fantasize that you will be when x, y, or z has come to pass. We're not really made to live alone (your mileage may vary, and hermits and anchorites have of course had a particular vocation), but sometimes we are alone, and then we have to be our own best company, our own truest friend, a person we can depend on to treat us with compassion. If that's hard, well, then, it's a thing to practice, as you would practice the piano. Ten minutes of scales, ten minutes of finding something to admire about yourself right now --- and not just your inner qualities, which I'm sure are impeccable, but your material self. Your body. Your face. Your hair. Practice seeing yourself as another person might see you, walking down the street, and think: that's a really beautiful person.
And if it helps you, collect images. You know I do that with my various Instagram collections, and this is really why. It helps to have visual imagery related to the value I want to hold for myself.
Like this, for example. This woman is cool and beautiful and vibrant just as she is, right now, at this stage in her life. When I ask myself what kind of old lady I want to be, this imagery helps a lot. Not that I want to wear all the exact same things, but I can visualize what it looks like to be myself, just older.
I also really love this woman's style and vibe. I would wear the exact outfit she's wearing in that linked photo. Some of her colors and patterns aren't ones I would wear (I adore the cut of this dress, but would not wear that precise color/fabric), but I really like how she looks. And I don't think, She'd be so pretty if she weren't fat. She is pretty, just as she is, today. I think I can say that without making some larger value claim about weight. I have no idea what the state of this woman's health is. I have no idea what she eats, or what her goals are, or any of that, which is frankly none of my business. I just know that if I saw her walking down the street, what I would think is, Wow, she looks great. She makes most of her own clothes, and her style is amazing. Being one size and not another does not disqualify her from being amazing, and I don't mean amazing, but, either.
On that note, it's time for me to walk down the street, in company with Dora, who also looks great (until you, a stranger, try to speak to her or look as though you want to pet her --- then she just looks like Cujo, which is not so great).
AFTERNOON UPDATE:
Have written roughly 500 words of fiction, but I've spent most of the day participating in a fun open thread conversation (or lots of overlapping conversations) on the Substack.
Been out a couple of times with the dog. Props to me for remembering to wear my transition sunglasses out in the sun.
Here they are, transitioned back again, because I'm still wearing them indoors.
Decided to take down my linen lab coat from my Poshmark closet, as well as the rayon lace-yoke blouse pictured above. I'm just marking them "Not for Sale," so that if I change my mind, I don't have to recreate the whole listing. But I started thinking about how I could wear the white blouse with my off-white linen skirt and that natural-shade linen coat, and how that would be a cool outfit . . . and I don't want to be wearing something while it's marked for sale, because what if, at the exact moment somebody bought it, I spilled red wine on it or something?
Anyway, especially since I'm not buying things at the moment, it behooves me really to make an effort to wear things that are in this house. I am thinking that I might just extend my no-buy (even though it makes me want to buy things), because I have enough. I have clothes to wear. I have clothes that I am actually glad to wear when I wear them, and I think the thing to do is precisely that. I just need to wear them. I need to put thought into outfits and create some new easy defaults, to go with the defaults I already have --- if that makes sense. I hope it does. What doesn't make sense is to keep on adding things to my closet, when I already have a very generous rotation of things to wear in every conceivable circumstance --- not too much, but definitely enough.
I do keep enjoying my Instagram folder Style Mood Board/look book, though. Looking at clothes can make me want to buy more, but it can also give me ideas for things to do with clothes I already own. Looks like this, for example, remind me that I have button shirts that I can wear over dresses, but also prompt me to wear the linen coat in the same way. And is this not basically what I was doing the other day with my floral skirt and cotton pullover? In short, when I like someone else's look, I can say to myself not I want that dress/cardigan/skirt/whatever, but How can I get that kind of vibe with my own clothes? Because maybe it's a vibe I hadn't thought of before, but could absolutely create out of elements I already own. I love this tonal outfit with a big linen scarf/shawl, and maybe I can't do quite that layering of soft browns, but I do have a big linen scarf/shawl, and I can accomplish something like that look with it, over a linen dress, if I feel like it. And so on.
Anyway, I'm getting hungry and really want to go to Blowing Rock, but the husband seems to be on the phone with someone in Norway, attempting to pay the parking ticket we got in Trondheim last summer and have been trying to pay literally since before we left Trondheim last summer. Jeg kan betale i appen, they tell me, but in reality Jeg kan ikke betale i appen, which I found out only after I had downloaded appen and tried. We sent them a check, only to have it sent back . . . It would be nice to have this taken care of before we go back, although on the other hand, we do know the hours for this office (it closed early the day we were leaving, when we were trying to pay the stupid ticket) and can go in person when we're there. Just what we want to do on vacation, of course --- take care of bureaucratic loose ends from our last visit to that fair city. But whatever. We're honest people. We want to pay our debt to society --- in this case, to atone for our parkering blunder.
Ah, looks like we're leaving in about an hour. Maybe I'll take ol' Dora for another spin before we go.