in which i've got that thanksgiving feeling

For some reason this outfit feels very academic. Maybe it's the plaid scarf and the headband. And the oxfords. Anyway, I really enjoy academic-chic, especially in the fall. I know we're nearing winter, but I'm going to milk this season for all it's worth!

(dress/scarf: thrifted; tights: hue; shoes: seychelles)

I am feeling pretty good about life this week. Don't you love it when that happens? K and I are going to see Gogol Bordello on Thursday night, which will be epic, and I really want to see Hairspray this weekend but I'm not sure I can afford it/anyone will go with me. But I'm keeping it in the back of my mind, just in case a wealthy benefactor wants to take me out (mom?) ;)

In the meantime, I've been feeling very appreciative of my job/boyfriend/family/friends/health lately. This does wonders for my mental wellbeing. I suppose 'tis the season for Thanksgiving, 'tisn't it?

in which i dress like a dried rose

This week absolutely flew by for some reason. That's all right with me :)

(dress/earrings: vintage; cardigan: target; shoes: seychelles)

I'm super excited for the fair tomorrow, but it is definitely going to be chilly! We are getting down into the low 30s overnight this week, which means frost--summer disappeared in a snap! Tonight I will drink some wine and eat some goat cheese and roasted veggie pizza and either a) be productive and write or b) watch a million episodes of ANTM. Those options are about as opposite as it gets, but we'll see how I'm feeling ;) I say boo to K being in school again. He's always writing papers and studying on the weekends! I never did that sort of thing when I was in college... just kidding. Sort of. Oh well, I'm kind of glad that he's hibernating in his office so often--I get a lot more of my own work done that way!

I hope you all have lovely weekends!

in which i am an old lady who lives in (these) shoes

Ahh, back in my happy place. This outfit is far more "me" than anything I've come up with lately. What can I say? I was born in October--I am meant to dress for autumn. This may or may not be something that an elderly woman would wear. I am okay with that (because, after all, I am no spring chicken).

(hat/blouse: vintage, gifts; skirt/belt/scarf: thrifted; shoes: seychelles)

I was thinking about back-to-school the other day (aren't we all, at this time of year?), and how the whole thing was always so exciting. In elementary school there were new outfits and lunchboxes and that grown-up feeling of passing through each grade; in high school there were new outfits and fat textbooks and the thrill of locating a new locker and the prospect of eight hours each day spent giggling and passing notes with friends; in college there were more new outfits and fatter (more expensive) textbooks and a whole new world full of strangers that would eventually become some of the closest friends I would ever know. And now? The seasons blend from one to the next but the days don't change.

Ever since I graduated (in 2007-yikes!) I constantly consider going back to school for something, whether it be fashion design or creative writing or cultural anthropology. And then I take a step back and remind myself that there were very few classes in college that I really, truly enjoyed. There was my Philosophy of the Individual writing seminar freshman year, in which I did not speak a word but would leave bursting with excitement and immediately call someone to discuss. There was my Intro to Ethics lecture with a visiting professor from Stanford, which everyone seemed to hate but I actually found fascinating (when I wasn't doing the DFP crossword). There was my Post-Modern Literature course with a wacky ladyprofessor who just rambled on and told stories for an hour and then told us we would no longer be having class because she wasn't getting paid enough (but boy, was she a character!), and my Chinese culture class that surprised me by being quite a treat, since I had never had much interest in Asian studies or history before. There was my Film Theory class, in which only the graduate students ever engaged in discussion but the professor was really amazing. And then there were a slew of really awful classes that I suffered through day in and day out for four years of my life. And I realized that I don't actually much like to be educated. I love to learn, I adore reading, I think that I have a broad scope of skills and interests, but I do not like being forced to fit my train of thought into whatever current a course corrals it into. I either want to learn something or I don't--and if I don't, why waste my time?

I'm still figuring out what my next steps in life will be. Maybe I will end up going to graduate school (theoretically, I would only be taking classes that were directly related to my area of interest). Maybe I will start my own little business. Maybe I really will become a brilliant filmmaker after all this time. Who knows. But these are the feelings that always surface in September, year in and year out. This is the season for reinvention.

And if I don't get to it soon enough, there is always Spring ;)

in which i canoodle with superman

It's Friday and I couldn't be more delighted. The weekend is supposed to be glorious and I can't wait to partake of some seriously summery activities!!

(shorts/shirt: thrifted; socks: uo; shoes: seychelles)

I feel like a ridiculously obnoxious ice cream cone today... one of those weird flavors involving bubblegum (funnily enough, I think I most resemble the 'Superman' flavor, which will become relevant below, I promise. Speaking of ice cream, I've been trying to get back on a healthy-eating kick, and this was my dinner last night:

But then, I also inhaled a "small" creemee (which was actually about six inches tall, not including the cone) and all was lost. Oh well, it's not like it's bathing suit season or anything...

...

Last night K and I watched Waiting for 'Superman', and if I wasn't already in a panic about the educational system in our country, I'm sure this film would have been even more devastating. I think I cried for about five straight minutes at the end of the film. The wild-eyed leader of the Teacher's Union absolutely enraged me, and I was completely baffled that the DC district teachers wouldn't cooperate with the plan for an educational overhaul that would eliminate tenure but make it possible for good teachers to earn twice as much. By refusing to even vote on the issue, they were basically admitting that they valued their own job security (regardless of whether or not they were actually impacting their students in a positive way) over the (incredibly necessary) improvement of our education system. This may be a sensitive subject for some, but as a person who has been tentatively considering entering the teaching profession, the sort of all-for-one-and-one-for-all mentality was, to be frank, frightening. I definitely support labor unions for manufacturing and the like, but teachers are responsible for molding the minds of our future generations! That is no small task, and should absolutely not be left in the hands of lazy or incompetent educators. The importance of public schooling is that the forefront of my mind right now, because my elementary school was almost shut down this year due to low enrollment. I went from a small elementary school in my hometown (12 kids in my class) to a regional high school the next town over that was (at that time) considered one of the worst in the country because of poor test scores. When I was a student there, my class dropped from 85 students to 50 over six years (7-12), but I was "tracked" in the accelerated class and actually got a pretty decent education. Most of the kids did not. By the time my younger brother entered high school, things had changed dramatically. The tracking system had been eliminated, and the school had actually risen in status to become a "Bronze Medal" school. I could go on and on. Basically, I just think that it is so important that we find a way to transform our floundering (or just plain failing) schools and give kids a chance to make something of themselves. It's very much within reach if we just TRY. It's just like the health care system! We are living with a system that worked in the 1950s, but times have changed and our systems need to change as well. American stubbornness is so endlessly frustrating.

Anyway!! I didn't mean to rant at you on a Friday afternoon (I've been doing a lot of ranting since I've been back... sorry about that). To lighten the mood, here are a few things currently making my smile a little brighter:

*pretty bouquet of just-because black-eyed susans from this pretty cool boyfriend I know*

*farmer's market menu planning*

*blue sky and fluffy clouds*

*sunshine nail polish*

*red wine or ice cream on the 'stoop' on a summer evening*

Have a wonderful weekend, everyone!

polka dots and productivity

I hereby dub this "productivity week." Last night I did the dishes, went grocery shopping, made a delicious sandwich (and enough veggies to last through the week), and finished three pending hem projects that have been sitting in the back of my closet for weeks now.

(polkadot blouse/belt: bargain boutique; cardigan: h&m; skirt: vintage; tights: hue; shoes: seychelles)

There is so much that I want to do with my life that I sometimes get overwhelmed (okay, I always get overwhelmed) and do none of it. Well I'm having none of that anymore. I want to spend my time alternating between writing and sewing, and maybe getting a little something accomplished once and a while! I have about four million projects on the back burner/in progress, so my biggest problem is organization... luckily for me, I love making to-do lists! :)

Tonight I'm taking K out to dinner to celebrate his first day back at school since finishing undergrad three and a half years ago. That makes me feel a little old.

to-be-looked-at-ness

When I was in college, one of my advanced electives was Film Theory with Roy Grundmann. At the time, I remember being particularly interested in the concept of "to-be-looked-at-ness," accompanied in the class by a viewing of "Gentleman Prefer Blondes." I was a terrible undergrad--the graduate students dominated the lecture hall with their superior experience, and I generally just sat quietly and sipped my Starbucks in the back. I also admit to occasional, unintentional snoozing in the warm, dark auditorium, especially in the beginning of the semester when we watched primarily silent films (The Passion of Joan of Arc? Zzzz...). Anyway, some classes were more fascinating than others, and I rather enjoyed eavesdropping on the discourse of my fellow film students in such an open forum.

The concept of "to-be-looked-at-ness," outlined by Laura Mulvey in her 1975 essay Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema, applies a psychoanalytical framework to film theory, especially with regard to the portrayal of women in classic cinema. She blamed the patriarchal Hollywood system for casting women as objects "to be looked at" by the (usually) male protagonist. She claimed that there were two modes of the male gaze: voyeuristic and fetishistic, where women were seen as whores or madonnas, respectively.

I wanted to do a camera-conscious blog post because I think the relationship between blogger, camera, and (mostly) unknown audience is a new sort of "to-be-looked-at-ness" that has emerged in full force over the past decade. Ever since the upstart Myspace (thankfully fading) and the overwhelming presence of Facebook in our everyday lives (not mine), and now, perhaps especially, with blogging of the personal-style variety, there is an opportunity to shape our own images--to usurp the power of the human gaze (not necessarily, and not even mostly, male) and funnel it through more favorable channels. We are given an opportunity to take advantage of our "to-be-looked-at-ness"--and, to some extent, to control it. The verdict is still out on whether or not this is a positive thing. While photographic film is still a pretty superficial medium, at least the self-portraiture of most style bloggers is a reflection of the ability of a modern woman to determine her identity, and the "to-be-looked-at-ness" originates with her own inward gaze.

I had a very relaxing extra-long weekend where K and I did pretty much nothing at all. We went for a bike ride up in Isle La Motte, which was delightful, had a champagne-and-baguette picnic lakeside in my hometown, and read--a lot. I finished The Post-Birthday World by Lionel Shriver, plowed through A Year in Provence by Peter Mayle (yes, please) and already made it halfway through The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood (one of my very favorites). I am a frequent visitor of book sales, used book stores, and the book section of Goodwill, so I have quite a library! There is always a new book on hand when I finish one. Also, the September issue of Vogue finally arrived at my door on Friday, which has kept me plenty preoccupied.

Here's to long weekends and short work weeks! Cheers :)