What's in Your Closet?

I've never been a prime example of fashion.

I'm not completely proud of that fact, but in my opinion, style changes way too frequently anyway. Did you know that in the 'ol Roman days, the fashion wouldn't change for centuries at a time? Women would pass on their dresses to their daughters, and men would hand down their armor to their sons. I can only imagine how long it would take them to put together a piece of clothing anyway. They would have to grow the elements to create a textile, then create the textile, then figure out the pattern, then sew it together...etc. As a casual sewer, I can tell you it's time consuming enough to walk into a JoAnn Fabrics and pick out a bolt of fabric and a pattern without having to grow and create that fabric myself. Shoot, it's even easier to walk into Old Navy during a sale and leave with a shirt cheaper and better made than something I could have put together. No wonder those Romans didn't change the standard dress code, who would want to go through the hassle?

Nowadays, every season brings a style change. Different collars, shirt sleeve length, cut, color. If you buy a shirt on sale, you're probably buying last season's model, which means you're already out of style. And the more confounding thing is fashion availability - Fall's fashions hit the stores before summer is barely out of the gate. Winter's fashions appear while we're still wearing tank tops for that late summer heat. Sorry, but a turtleneck doesn't really appeal when it's 90 degrees out, and by the time I will want to buy that turtleneck, I'll have to weed through the sale racks, since spring's tank tops will have prime floor space at GAP. Ridiculous.

All of this doesn't excuse my severe lack of fashion sense, however. It started young. In elementary school, when girls were dressing up in their best dresses for school, I was in jeans with a jean shirt, or bright pink silk shorts, resembling a circus tent on each of my skinny legs, with a long t-shirt that almost cleared my knees. Nope, not kidding. My favorite outfit was a pear of gray sweatpants and a gray t-shirt with a penguin on it.

Middle school was my pinnacle of fashion faux pas. In the time of life when most of my friends were getting into fashion and dressing up, I was blissfully ignorant of anything of the sort. I went to a school with a dress code (dresses or skirts were required for girls), and redefined that code. I loved my flannel dresses. I had two, one in red and one in green, and wore white keds with them. I had butt-long hair that I didn't really even know I had, it just sort of hung there. The school allowed girls to wear biker shorts under their skirts since we were still kids and they didn't want gym to be awkward. I thought this was the coolest thing ever (I'm wearing shorts under my skirt, how neat is that?!) and took the opportunity to enjoy the novelty of it by doing a can-can dance in between serves during a gym volleyball class.

Since I really didn't know how to shop, I didn't. I wore whatever my mom picked up for me, or, more often, just wore what my sister had in her closet. NOTE: my sister is 4 1/2 years older than me. She was a tall, athletic high schooler when I was in middle school. I was tiny and scrawny, 80 pounds soaking wet, and unaware that her clothes didn't fit me. She looked so beautiful in them, I thought I looked the same.

She had this one shirt I adored. It was a jean (I had a thing with jean shirts) peasant shirt. It looked like something out of a Shakespeare costume shop - long, billowy puffed sleeves, a rounded collar and pearl buttons. I thought it was just beautiful. I stuffed it into my waist-high pleated khaki pants, oblivious that the extra fabric left a huge bunch around my middle. Do you remember when it was cool to stuff your shirt in, then pull some of it out, creating a nice little ledge of fabric around you? Well, I un-tucked accordingly, pulling yards of fabric out, fluffing and straightening until I felt like prime fashion stuff. Oh, I felt cool. I moved through the halls of school that day confident and proud, when in truth I was practically billowing my way from class to class like a ship with it's sail full and open, the extra fabric bunched around my middle, my sleeves catching drafts in the hall and making me look like someone in those blow-up sumo wrestler costumes.

I wish I could say it got better in high school. That would be a lie. In fact, it was worse. At least in middle school I wasn't aware of my lack of fashion sense. In high school, not only was I keenly aware of how poorly in tune with fashion I was, but I still didn't have the skills to change it.

My sister had left for college, taking her closet with her, and I was on my own (although I kept a few mementos. Note the shirt my sister is wearing in the picture above, and the shirt I'm wearing in the picture to the left...along with overalls, socks and Mary Janes. Eeesh). Shopping was an experience. I would purchase something, take it to school and realize that I still didn't look like the rest of my classmates. I found a few items I just loved - black velvet pants, to name one. Did you know that black velvet crushes is you sit on it? I walked around school with white butt marks on my pants for a long time unawares.

Eventually I got some sort of hang of it, and by college I had it figured out. Jean shirts are not cool. The right jacket can make any outfit look good. Wear clothes that fit. But I also learned that there's more to it than just that. There's something deeper about fashion that goes beyond the Paris runway or New York boutiques.

I've learned that clothes are just as telling of who you are as your hobbies, your friendships, your job and your favorite food. What you wear expresses to the world who you are and what you believe. Think not? Try this on for size.

Why do you wear a baggy shirt vs. a tight shirt? Is it more comfortable, or are you uncomfortable with yourself and don't wish to show anything off to the world? Why do you wear dresses more than jeans? Or tennis shoes more than heels? Some would say "I'm just more comfortable that way." To which I say, exactly. You are a comfortable person, you're relaxed and chill, and you reflect that in your fashion choices.

This is not a bad thing, it was just a revelation to me that I expressed who I was by what I wore.  You may have realized this long before I did, but it's newer to me. It makes me look at my closet and my nearby GAP store in a whole new light. There are still fashion standards, of course. I'm not going to tack on a corset and gussy myself up in the latest fashions of the 1800's. Looking at some of dresses in the civil war era, I'm not sure I could fit through a modern door with the hoop skirts they donned.

Within the confines of today's basic styles, though, it's almost therapeutic to approach my closet each day with a different intent. I'm not just putting on clothing, I'm expressing who I am to the world. I'm not just adding accessories, I'm adding to a non-verbal expression of my personality and beliefs. I have the chance to define and redefine myself every day, and express my beliefs about myself and others to the world. It's quite lovely, actually. It makes fashion something fun, non-intimidating and something I can own rather than dread.

So, what's in your closet?