A couple of weeks ago, I spent an afternoon shopping with a good friend, who promised to be my very own Clinton and Stacy, a combination fashion coordinator/cheerleader/honest evaluator as I searched for the perfect outfit. The plan was to buy a dress, possibly shoes.
Cindy earned her title that day. Her energy never flagged and she was kind and truthful throughout it all. I think I tried on something like twenty-five dresses (maybe more) in a few different departments in two stores. Granted, some of these garments were on my body, or partly on it depending how you looked at it, for about three seconds before we ruled them out but still: that’s a lot of dresses. Almost all of them were black and it was hard to believe there could be that many variations on black dresses but there appeared to be an endless supply.
But it had to be black, right? You don't want to buy a dress for an event, love it in the dressing room and feel daring and one-of-a-kind, and then be the woman wearing the lime green dress all night.
It won’t surprise you to know that the dress I liked best, the one both of us decided was “the one,” was the most expensive dress of the day. It felt fabulous. It was fitted but not too fitted. I didn’t have to worry about back fat or cleavage. The fabric was elegant but not flashy. Even modeling it while wearing my socks, it felt right. Except for one thing: the armholes.
It was sleeveless. For someone like me who feels cold every single day of the year, with the possible exception of two afternoons on the beach in August, even considering a sleeveless dress, especially for a January evening, is significant. But this shopping trip was partly based on doing the unexpected. Serious shopping for this kind of outfit is something I do maybe once a decade.
Back to the dress. From one angle, Cindy had a moment where she could see my bra. It wasn't a horrible gap but it wasn’t great and it was a lot of money to spend to have my bra showing, even if it was just from one or two angles. No matter, the helpful saleswoman called on the seamstress to evaluate the extent of the “fix” that would have to take place to make this perfect for me.
The woman doing the alterations was a genius from Ukraine. (Her accent reminded me of my lovely sister-in-law, who is also from Ukraine.) With a couple of pins, she made the difference in the dress and it looked better.
Me (looking in the mirror): What do you think?
Cindy and saleswoman and seamstress: Great…looks very nice…(general consensus that this was the best of the day.)
Me (still looking in the mirror): What about my arms? Do they look horrible? Do they look like people will say, “What made her think she could get away with that dress with those arms?”
Cindy and saleswoman: (similar versions of something like) They look fine!
Seamstress (looking dismayed and kind of scornful): What is wrong with women? What would make you think there’s something wrong with your….there’s nothing wrong with…(her voice trails off as she basically shakes her head at the entire female population of this country.)
We pressed her on it and she said women in America have problems with every single thing about themselves and she sees a lot of women. Everyday. In all kinds of sizes wearing all kinds of clothing. I’m guessing at least a couple of them have mentioned their arms, or their tummies, or their legs, or their necks, their shoulders, their waists or their hips to the seamstress. According to her, every single one of them is horrified at her image.
Wind up of the story is I had the dress altered, and bought some astoundingly beautiful black heels and felt good about every bit of it.
The lesson here? God knows. Maybe it’s that you can’t try on too many black dresses before you find the right one. Maybe it’s that no one thinks about your arms a sixteenth as much as you do. Maybe it’s that having a Ukrainian woman look you in the eye and basically tell you to get over yourself and stop being such a neurotic lunatic about something like the shape of your arms is a good thing.
I may need to give her a call her once in a while for a reminder.
Showing posts with label black dress. Show all posts
Showing posts with label black dress. Show all posts
Saturday, January 30, 2010
Sunday, January 24, 2010
It's official: we're thinking WAY too much about laundry.
God help me. I am clearly missing something here. Let me explain and then please, please tell me where I went wrong.
On a ‘normal’ day, or in a ‘normal’ week (and I use that word loosely), here are the kinds of things I have on my mind, in no particular order of importance: my kids, husband, and Mom, the rest of the family, my friends and keeping up with what’s going on in their lives, my job, my boss, paying our bills, trying to lose weight but still eating chocolate, getting on the treadmill more than twice a week, keeping up with my writing work (the blog and the column), thinking about what’s for dinner and possibly preparing it, running errands, picking up around the house, reading a book, watching some television I really enjoy, checking my email and other electronic connections, maybe taking in a movie, and trying to get to bed before midnight.
That’s just the personal stuff. International and national news also commands our attention and response, whether it’s to the tragic outcome of the quake in Haiti and the billions needed to counteract it, or to the tragic outcome of our elected officials in Washington and the billions needed to counteract that. In between those stories, you have little time to consider things like the tragic outcome of James Cameron’s or Kate Gosselin’s hairstyles.
I hear you. That sounds like just about every life you know, including your own. Fair enough. We have dozens of time-saving, money-saving, portable devices designed to help us be more efficient and more organized. We hop online to read headlines, newspapers, and magazines because we can click, read, comprehend and bookmark. We download news, use our apps and DVR everything until we have time for it. Fine. I don’t think I could cram one more factoid into my head on any given day.
Which means there is really no explanation for the following. Somehow, someone somewhere ran a focus group and now believes we have the time and energy to consider this. Go ahead and watch it if you want to feel confused. Then come back and let’s discuss it, shall we? I’ll wait.
Question: You’re kiddin’ me, right? It’s not enough that I’m faced with an entire wall of fabric softener in a grocery store? It’s not enough that I have to make a choice about the right scent for the fabric softener I think I need for my rough, scratchy clothing, which, by the way, I don’t even own? Now I’m supposed to match my mood with my fabric softener?
Answer: Yes. According to Downy, we (read: women) can now choose from a line of products called “Simple Pleasures.” Why? Because according to Downy, every woman has many sides. True enough, I suppose. I just didn’t know every one of them needed its own fabric softener. “Lavender Serenity” = Calm. “Spice Blossom” = Daring. Elegant =… oh I don’t know. I stopped listening. There are two more scents available and I have no idea what they represent. I did hear that every one of them contains “scent pearls.” Thank God for that.
You can’t miss the gorgeous beach house where all these moods appear to be taking place; or the adorable husband who enters the scene just as the woman models the sweet little black dress in the mirror. Their equally adorable children peek in through the window and watch mom and dad canoodle, wrapped up in the Downy magic no doubt.
The black dress, by the way, is the same dress she wears to frolic on the beach with the Mr. and their perfect little girl and boy at the end of the spot. She has her silky lavender wrap around her shoulders as well. As we now know, wearing those two pieces indicates she is feeling both calm and elegant.
And by the way, since when did fabric softeners become a ‘woman’s only’ product? Doesn’t a man have “sides?” Doesn’t he want to have the fabric against his body to reflect his state of mind?
Answer: Nope. Because he knows it’s ridiculous and good for him.
On the other hand, since they’ve already launched the campaign, they may as well expand the line. Otherwise, I’m a little concerned. Question: What Downy scent should I buy when I feel pretty darn cranky? Which one for those times I feel fat? Or how about exhausted, or weepy? These are also some of the many sides women have and as of right now, they are not being addressed by my fabric softener.
I swear to God, if someone opened a retro grocery store with about 7,000 fewer SKUs in it, I’d shop there. I need every bit of my brain and energy to put toward thinking about things that matter, not the serene/daring/elegant nature of my fabric softener. Who’s with me?
On a ‘normal’ day, or in a ‘normal’ week (and I use that word loosely), here are the kinds of things I have on my mind, in no particular order of importance: my kids, husband, and Mom, the rest of the family, my friends and keeping up with what’s going on in their lives, my job, my boss, paying our bills, trying to lose weight but still eating chocolate, getting on the treadmill more than twice a week, keeping up with my writing work (the blog and the column), thinking about what’s for dinner and possibly preparing it, running errands, picking up around the house, reading a book, watching some television I really enjoy, checking my email and other electronic connections, maybe taking in a movie, and trying to get to bed before midnight.
That’s just the personal stuff. International and national news also commands our attention and response, whether it’s to the tragic outcome of the quake in Haiti and the billions needed to counteract it, or to the tragic outcome of our elected officials in Washington and the billions needed to counteract that. In between those stories, you have little time to consider things like the tragic outcome of James Cameron’s or Kate Gosselin’s hairstyles.
I hear you. That sounds like just about every life you know, including your own. Fair enough. We have dozens of time-saving, money-saving, portable devices designed to help us be more efficient and more organized. We hop online to read headlines, newspapers, and magazines because we can click, read, comprehend and bookmark. We download news, use our apps and DVR everything until we have time for it. Fine. I don’t think I could cram one more factoid into my head on any given day.
Which means there is really no explanation for the following. Somehow, someone somewhere ran a focus group and now believes we have the time and energy to consider this. Go ahead and watch it if you want to feel confused. Then come back and let’s discuss it, shall we? I’ll wait.
Question: You’re kiddin’ me, right? It’s not enough that I’m faced with an entire wall of fabric softener in a grocery store? It’s not enough that I have to make a choice about the right scent for the fabric softener I think I need for my rough, scratchy clothing, which, by the way, I don’t even own? Now I’m supposed to match my mood with my fabric softener?
Answer: Yes. According to Downy, we (read: women) can now choose from a line of products called “Simple Pleasures.” Why? Because according to Downy, every woman has many sides. True enough, I suppose. I just didn’t know every one of them needed its own fabric softener. “Lavender Serenity” = Calm. “Spice Blossom” = Daring. Elegant =… oh I don’t know. I stopped listening. There are two more scents available and I have no idea what they represent. I did hear that every one of them contains “scent pearls.” Thank God for that.
You can’t miss the gorgeous beach house where all these moods appear to be taking place; or the adorable husband who enters the scene just as the woman models the sweet little black dress in the mirror. Their equally adorable children peek in through the window and watch mom and dad canoodle, wrapped up in the Downy magic no doubt.
The black dress, by the way, is the same dress she wears to frolic on the beach with the Mr. and their perfect little girl and boy at the end of the spot. She has her silky lavender wrap around her shoulders as well. As we now know, wearing those two pieces indicates she is feeling both calm and elegant.
And by the way, since when did fabric softeners become a ‘woman’s only’ product? Doesn’t a man have “sides?” Doesn’t he want to have the fabric against his body to reflect his state of mind?
Answer: Nope. Because he knows it’s ridiculous and good for him.
On the other hand, since they’ve already launched the campaign, they may as well expand the line. Otherwise, I’m a little concerned. Question: What Downy scent should I buy when I feel pretty darn cranky? Which one for those times I feel fat? Or how about exhausted, or weepy? These are also some of the many sides women have and as of right now, they are not being addressed by my fabric softener.
I swear to God, if someone opened a retro grocery store with about 7,000 fewer SKUs in it, I’d shop there. I need every bit of my brain and energy to put toward thinking about things that matter, not the serene/daring/elegant nature of my fabric softener. Who’s with me?
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