Nosegay tied to a fence post at an overlook on the Whiteside Mountain trail in the Nantahala National Forest, outside Cashiers, North Carolina. We speculated about why it was there. Had someone fallen over (or jumped) and someone else was memorializing? Possible, of course, though rather a chilling reason for this lovely bouquet of wildflowers, two kinds of aster and goldenrod, clearly picked along the trail, to be there.
A lovely couple of days with Marly and her husband Michael in Cullowhee and the surrounding mountains. Michael, who is an enthusiastic and elaborate cook, set kingly (or queenly) meals before us at regular intervals --- the most interesting dinner consisted of reuben sandwiches made with collard greens instead of corned beef (a recipe from some restaurant in New Orleans, and far better than it might sound, or than any of us really expected), and a side of cheese grits with mushrooms.
We sat around and talked a lot, but also went hiking for several hours on Monday, on the aforementioned trail. Here are some photos:
Writers on the trail:
But also in our Sunday best, having returned from our respective churches:
Here's a little rundown of what I wore, the days I didn't post here:
Monday:
I started out in my Wool& Teal Fiona (M) and thrifted Pure cashere cardigan, and changed back into this outfit after our hike. For the hike I wore (as pictured above) my Wisteria Willow:
(A lot more flattering, honestly, when I was posing myself and conscious of angles than in photos taken by someone else on the trail . . . but oh well. It was quite comfortable to hike in, and with bike shorts underneath, the right length for scrambling).
Tuesday:
I wore my utterly reliable Dark-Gray-Blue NPL Smock dress with the same cashmere cardigan and Birks. I think that if I ask myself whether I should pack this dress or not, the answer has to be yes. I really should not even ask. It's possibly the most dependable dress I own, in terms of making me feel good and, I think, look good.
So this is what I wore to eat breakfast, sit and talk some more, then take my leave a little after noon yesterday. I drove through absolute literal torrents of rain in the mountains, the kind of blind-driving rain that pours over the road so that you're constantly hydroplaning just a little, feeling your tires leave the asphalt and float for a minute before making contact again. I was glad to leave it behind at last --- somewhere around Old Fort, there was a point where I-40 stopped being wet and was dry as if rain had never fallen.
The rain caught up with us here last night. While I was waiting for the husband to come home and binge-watching Unforgotten (a better-written series than Annika, though featuring Nicola Walker in much the same kind of role), a big thunderstorm broke over us, sending Dora out of her mind with terror. That storm system blew through, but while we were out walking, around 9:30, there was constant lightning and, eventually, also thunder. We made it home before the heavens opened again, but it did rain hard and loudly for quite some time, and I had to sit with the dog in her crate until she calmed down enough to go to sleep. She's still sleeping it off now, and I'm about to get dressed for the day.
High of 81F, by the way, significantly cooler than it was over the weekend. 98% humidity, however, so it won't feel all that fresh.
Wearing today:
*Secondhand Not Perfect Linen Mama dress (S) in Caffe Mocha, bought last week, first wear
*Secondhand Birkenstock Mayaris, bought in April, worn so frequently as a warm-weather default that I'm not even bothering to keep track. I paid $28 for them, and they have long since more than recouped that cost-per-wear.
This dress is the latest, and possibly the last, of my large purchases in a NO DRESSES year. Yeah, yeah. I know. As I noted when I ordered it last week, I used my rather large credit, left over from my sale of a Wool& dress, to purchase this dress, so it cost me hardly anything in actual money. I will recoup that cost quickly in wears, I can foresee.
So, I really love this dress. When I tried it on last night, after I'd gotten home and collected my mail from the day I was gone, at first I worried that a Small was too small. I certainly could not wear a smaller bodice than this. Most of my other dresses are S/M, which I think means the bodice is cut to "medium" size measurements, but I'm not entirely sure.
As it happens, I had both my Leila dresses taken up in the shoulders, because the necklines were too low and gapey, and the armholes were too large. When I got each one back from the seamstress, I experienced a brief frisson of worry that I'd actually had them taken up too much, that the armholes were too small now. But over time, they haven't bothered me at all, and the fit feels much more right overall. I say that because I've had the same frisson of worry with this dress. The sleeves are definitely not loose, and there's definitely not too much give across my back, and the armholes are definitely not too big. But putting it on this morning and committing to wearing it all day, already I'm feeling that the fit is okay. I'm actually glad that the bodice isn't bigger. The shoulder seams sit right at the points of my shoulders. Any bigger, and the fit might start to feel sloppy. I think I just have to get used to the sleeves --- none of my other NPL dresses have sleeves --- and already I'm more comfortable with them than I was last night. I have swung my arms around, and I'm pretty sure that I could, for example, put a bag in an overhead bin on an airplane without undue limitation of movement or stress to my dress.
Meanwhile, I love the look. I appreciate the forgiving nature of these dresses, with their skimming shape that nevertheless provides some clear waist definition. I appreciate that this soft linen has flow and fluidity, but some structure, too --- it's never going to look droopy or stretched out, as (I hate to admit it, but photos don't lie) my Wool& swing dresses can do. I like that this dress has some beautiful tailoring, yet it still gives grace to my body, with its round belly and its various sags and droops.
I also love the color, which does not remind me at all of any kind of coffee, but maybe of the lavender syrup that some people like to put in their coffee. It's really a gray with a purple undertone, perfect for me. It's neutral enough that I could see wearing it with a whole range of colors, but purple enough for Advent and Lent.
Overall, this is going to be an incredibly versatile dress. It goes with more or less all my cardigans. AND it goes with The Blazer:
I could see this dress and blazer with either gray or Sand Dollar tights and either Mary Janes or Tari boots, as a later-autumn ensemble. I'm already thinking that this dress will have a place in my travel capsule for this reading/conference jaunt at the end of October.
I'm thinking, in fact that that travel capsule's core would be:
*This NPL Mama dress
*Grape Wine NPL Smock dress with waist ties
*Dark Blue-Gray Smock dress
*Wool& Marine Blue Fiona
*Green corduroy blazer
*Talbots plum merino blazer cardigan
*Teal cashmere cardigan
*One cropped cardigan: either old blue rayon or new-to-me thrifted cream cashmere cardigan with crystals
*Possibly my big Eileen Fisher brown merino cardigan coat
*Brown Mary Janes
*Tari boots
*Birk Papillio wedges
I HOPE I could fit all that in my backpack. I'll have to take a day pack as my "personal item" on the plane --- that way I'll be able to fit more things in.
Anyway, I'm very happy with this latest purchase. And truly, I'll have to sell another Wool& dress to buy another NPL dress, and I'm not ready to do that, so here we are at a stopping point, I think. I would still really love an NPL dress in Emerald Green, but on the other hand, I HAVE a green dress in my Wool& Brooklyn. That's not an absolute need in my wardrobe, just a wishlist item that might just need to wait until who knows when.
Today's agenda:
*Walk dog
*Catch up on essay research and writing for next week
*Mail out my Birk Madeiras, which have just sold
*Light housekeeping
*Dinner --- the husband wants steak, and fortunately I did buy two little packs of eye of round steak (cheap but satisfying) in my last grocery order. I think I'll cook them in the iron skillet in butter, with maybe a splash of balsamic vinegar --- I should get them out to thaw and then marinate them in balsamic vinegar and tamari, a good combination with enough acid to tenderize the meat pretty well, if you give it enough time. It then makes a good pan sauce reduced in butter.
I hear Dora starting to stir in her crate, so I guess I'd better go brush my teeth and get on with things.
POST-LUNCH UPDDATE:
I have
*walked the dog
*revised and uploaded an essay (two more to go for next week)
*done research for a poem I'm working on, in the course of which I learned a thing I had not known before: that a man in my childhood church, a man I had known all my life (who died in 2013 at 93) had been the last survivor of the sinking of the steamboat the M.E. Norman just off Memphis in 1925, a disaster that brought lasting fame to a man named Tom Lee, who used his little ferryboat to rescue people from the water. A riverside park in Memphis is named for him. Anyway, I had no idea that I knew a survivor of that incident. It wasn't the worst disaster on the river (that was the explosion of the steamboat the Sultana in 1865, just north of Memphis --- the boat was overloaded with freed Union prisoners of war, being taken north again to their homes, when it blew up, in what remains, I think, the worst maritime catastrophe in U.S. history). Anyway, the poem's not about that, but I was researching things to do with the Mississippi River, and it came up. Again, I had no idea that I'd known a person who had been there, on the Norman, in 1925. So that's my I-was-today-years-old epiphany.
*packed my Birk Madeiras to mail. Rebuilding my Poshmark credit balance little by little --- and it's good that I'm doing it slowly, in small increments, because I hope that will keep me from shopping again until I'm ready to look at another dress. I'd love to get into a groove where I'm not spending actual money on clothes that I haven't made by reselling things.
I'm going to drink some water now and think about Emily Dickinson.
Oh, I did also recently buy an Avigail Adam hair comb. I am constantly on the lookout for hair accessories as my hair grows out, because I like to wear it up or pulled back. I have a lot of cheapo things that I've bought at Walmart and Walgreens over the years: various scrunchies, claw clips, and pins, all of which I like. But I also like the idea of buying from a small-business maker, and I thought the hair prong linked above looked promising.
I'm still experimenting with it, but it seems to be holding this braided-bun updo securely in place. All I did was braid my hair and fold it up against the back of my head, tucking the ends under. I ran the prongs of the comb first up the braid lightly, to catch hair on the outside, then turning the prong right-side up, slid it down under my hair, against my scalp. If anything, this updo is a little too tight, but it is secure, which is the main thing I'm always going for. I can't be having my hair fall down all day long.
I have to be careful not to break hair as I slide the metal prongs through it, but if I'm careful, this is about as gentle an updo as you can get. I like that I can accomplish it with a single comb, whose teeth/prongs are long enough to hold everything in place. I really think I'm going to find this useful, and in a lot of ways prefer it to claw clips for updos. It's so much neater and more unobtrusive than a claw clip, and I really like that.
So I kind of feel like Emily Dickinson, vaguely . . .
I mean, really vaguely. But still.