Baby, You're a Star

Well, after a couple of rather heavy and/or ranty posts lately, I'd say that we're all due for something a bit more uplifting, eh? So today, I wanted to share something that I've been thinking about quite a lot over the past few months, and talk a little bit about kindness.

Memento Mori

Being pregnant in 2017 feels a little like I'm having a child in the last third of On the Beach. Even though I've literally never been more excited about anything else in my entire life, I can see the inexorable doom approaching.

A Body Positivity Setback

About two weeks ago, I encountered the biggest stumbling block on my body-positivity journey, and unsurprisingly, it's pregnancy-related: stretch marks.

25 Signs You're a Real Adult

Alright, who else thought they'd be welcomed to adulthood in a dramatic, unmistakable moment? That there would be a clear event that you could point to, after which you'd always feel like a 'real' adult? My dad often says that he used to think becoming an adult happened like this, but that he's come to realize that no matter how old he gets, he never quite feels like he's finished becoming a real grownup. And the older I get, the more I understand what he was talking about.

Memories, Painful and Comforting

Early in my first year of college, I came across two things that have stuck in my mind ever since. The first came up in the course of reading Homer's Iliad, during discussion of Achilles; the second, I believe, in a digressive discussion of language in a novel.

We Who Fight Monsters

In the past week and a half or so, I've seen a disturbing uptick in what I'd be tempted to call "body-shaming f***ery" if I wasn't publishing these words on the internet. There's good reason to believe all of this kerfuffle is just one miserable person on Instagram making one burner account after another and leaving idiotic, unkind comments on anyone who appears less miserable and more confident than she is. But still, since one pathetic schmuck can have outsize influence on the world, activity like this must not go unremarked.

You Matter.

Today's post is a bit of an anomaly for me. Rather than my usual vintage-inspired outfit/meandering narrative fare, I've decided it's time for a brief PSA. The topic: you, your mental health, and your importance to the people in your life.

So as to not bury the lede, let me start with my key point: no matter who you are, you are vitally important and deserve to feel ok. I don't know who's reading these words right now, but I'm as certain about this as I've ever been about anything in my entire life. No matter what your circumstances in life at this moment, you matter to somebody.

Barefaced and Fancy-Free

This is my face.

It's ok to not be ok.

I spend a LOT of time trying to maintain a positive attitude. Usually, this is great: I've found that focusing on happy thoughts helps to keep anxiety at bay, and helps me to dwell on what I have rather than what I've lost or wish I had.

Lately, though, I've found that it's much harder to maintain my usual equilibrium. This year has brought some truly difficult times, which have made even the happiest moments bittersweet. While I haven't lost hope for improvements on one front, I'm still mourning for the days when my family was still more whole than it currently is, and still coming to terms with losing my grandma.

Our Long National WTF

So I've got a million other things to blog about right now, but if I'm totally honest, all I've been able to think about lately is the cavalcade of unforced errors, Watergate-esque actions, and genuinely disturbing decisions made by the Trump White House.

Wiggle Week II

If you're anything like me, you were born sick and tired of looking at gorgeous clothes and thinking 'that's so pretty, but I could never wear that.' My style-obsessed heart aches for all the gorgeous people out there who've internalized society's garbage beauty standards. I've been there and it's not fun. Last November, I decided to devote a week to breaking through these negative thoughts, and thus Wiggle Week was born!

World's silliest graphic.

I'm Back

Hey, remember when I updated this blog like three times a week? Yeah, me too. I certainly didn't plan on taking a two-month hiatus from blogging, but 2017 hasn't exactly been kind to my family. If you follow me on Instagram, you might have some idea of what I'm talking about. Some of it isn't my story to tell, and truth be told, I'm not ready to get into the details that are mine to share. Suffice it to say that since my last post, I've either been sad, worried, or sick (or sometimes all three!), and just haven't felt up to photoshoots and upbeat posts.

On Managing Anxiety in the Age of Tr*mp

It might surprise you a bit to learn that I've struggled with anxiety a fair amount in my life, and continue to do so. While I'd thought that I'd finally mastered the art of outwitting my brain after about five years of relative calm, the presidential election brought some of my old fears roaring back to life.

To be honest, I feel a little silly even typing that, but it's true. Tr*mp's election opened a Pandora's Box of things I had forced back into shadows reserved especially for extremely-low-probability, extinction-level threats to humanity, and I've struggled somewhat to regain my footing. (Yes, I've decided to treat the name of our incoming President *shudder* as the expletive it deserves to become.) I've been thinking about this quite a bit as the Obama era draws to a close. But I think I've finally started to sort out how I'll get through the next four years, and I want to talk about that a little bit today.

On Odd Coping Habits

It's been a rough week, to say the least. If you saw my Election Day post, you probably know what it is that's been getting me down. I pride myself on being a positive, optimistic person, but I've really struggled in the face of everything that's been going on. Old anxieties and negative thought patterns that I'd thought were in the past have re-emerged with a vengeance, and I've had a difficult time figuring out how to address them.

#BlackLivesMatter

This will not be a post about style. It was intended to be about a gorgeous dress, but I feel like I can't pretend that nothing has happened in the world and retreat into fun things that make me feel personally fulfilled, because a cavalcade of absolutely horrific crimes against humanity have occurred in the past few days and I will not be silent when silence entails complicity. I try to keep my politics off of my blog, but in this case, I feel compelled to speak.

On Ethical Shopping, Part II

Way back in February, I shared some of my thoughts on more ethical shopping practices, and publicly committed myself to a more ethical approach to buying clothing. I'm happy to say that I've been largely successful at adhering to the principles I outlined there. While I failed at my no-buy month, I've kept to my plan of shopping with small, largely female-owned businesses, supporting domestic clothing manufacturing, and working towards lasting body confidence rather than buying new things to try to feel pretty. I'll write about my journey to body acceptance soon, I expect, but for today, I want to tackle two issues that didn't come up in my last foray into the ethics of clothes consumption: the environmental dimension and sizeism.

Before we dive into all of that, here are some photos of a dress that I can genuinely feel good about owning. It's the Kelly from Bernie Dexter in leopard print, it's made in the USA, and it's available in XS-4X. In these photos, I'm wearing it with ancient combat boots from Buffalo Exchange and leggings I borrowed from my little sister.

Wedding Planning for Introverts

My wedding is two weeks from this Saturday and I've finally figured out what it is that I don't like about wedding planning: it's an introvert's nightmare! I'm a serial hibernator: I tend to really like alone time and often go off the grid with emails if I don't need to check them for work. This is not a useful trait if you're planning a wedding, which involves contacting a zillion people who want to ask you what you want about things you don't really care about. I have a hard enough time calling people that I know really well to catch up, and I often need to psych myself up for a while to call the cable company or  phone in a prescription to CVS. Cold-calling wedding vendors is basically a waking nightmare. When you consider that wedding planning is also lazy-person hell, I have twice as many reasons to not really enjoy the planning process.

A zillion invitations, painstakingly addressed in my ridiculous chicken scratch.

On (More) Ethical Shopping

In my second post, I told you that this is a blog about my journeys. Whenever I go through a period of intense changes, I get hit with a tidal wave of introspection. As I’ve rediscovered my love of vintage-inspired style, I’ve given real thought to how I dress (and why! But that’s a post for another time.) And since I’m a political theorist dwelling with someone who teaches Marx for a living, it was inevitable that my thoughts would go from ‘oooooh pretty dress is pretty!’ to flights of ‘consumerism is bad’ fancy.

God, as envisioned by adjunct professors.

Rainbows in the Produce Aisle

A few days ago, I realized something. I am 95% certain that more people have read this fledgling blog than have read, or ever will read, the dissertation I spent over three years of my life writing. Now, I’m the type to see the humor in the unfortunate, so this initially struck me as one of those amusing ironies of life. At around 2AM that night, though, I remembered the stress that my dissertation occasioned: the constantly broken out skin (which has cleared up since I stopped teaching five classes at once), the days without any sort of human contact, and the agonizing over each and every sentence. Ah, there’s that downer feeling I should’ve had in the first place! But you’re probably here for the outfit, so let’s get on with it, shall we? I’ll get back to the ‘oh my god did I waste the bulk of my 20s?!?’ bit later (*spoiler alert:* the answer is ‘no.’)