Everything I Wore — Week of August 17

It feels like summer (derogatory)

Week of August 17 - August 23

Another week of putting clothes on my body every day! I see a lot of things about people’s bodies in other posts about fashion, and to be honest some of it bums me out. I’ll just say that a few years ago I tried to make a big shift in how I thought about clothes that didn’t look good on me to be about THE CLOTHES instead of a failure with MY BODY and even though I still catch myself sometimes saying something shitty about my body instead of a pair of pants, it’s gotten a lot better.

I do sometimes feel sad that there are things that just will never look good on me (or, at least, will never look the way I want them to on me so I will not wear them), but I also think that the more I’ve opened up to the idea that my goal in styling myself is not to look as small as possible, the better I actually ultimately look.

I think it’s similar to the whole thing where when people divest from dressing for the male gaze you often end up looking hotter to people (IF THAT IS INDEED YOUR GOAL) because confidence and authenticity are hotttttt (throw in competency and pfhew I’m gone).

This is all probably also related to me being more about body neutrality than body positivity. Ultimately, regardless of how I feel about my body, it IS me (remember you are one), and it is the body I have right now. My recent wrist strain injury brought to light how quickly a person can become disabled and how thrilled I was to recover to feeling, not better than before, but the same as before. I’m not here to dress some ideal version of my body that’s more conventionally attractive or has aged less or whatever else. I am here to dress what is here for me to dress.

Some new items for me this week, though in general I really am trying to do LESS OF THAT and MORE WEARING THINGS FROM MY OWN CLOSET IN THE SAME BUT ALSO NEW WAYS. Universal Standard, however, had a giant sale, Nooworks has a new print that is all but screaming my name, and in trying to put together ideal looks last week, I realized a hole in my wardrobe was a pair of bright sneakers that wasn’t red (I own too much green is the reason!!!), so, there you have it. I’m going to try to cool it on shopping for a bit. Also the bright sneakers haven’t arrived yet so I guess you’ll see those next week.

I wish I could remember whose Substack brought up the holes in wardrobes thing for me, but I will say I’m holding onto this. I am someone who’s very good at, for example, having two bold pairs of sneakers… both red. My favorite color. But still. I recently read that the ideal glasses selection is a good neutral, a wire frame, and a bold color. To be clear I have FOUR good neutrals, just got a wire frame, and have no bold color. I live in a weird world of lack and excess. Anyway. I feel like my later-2025 and 2026 goals will be more about noticing holes and thinking about the most effective way to fill them instead of… whatever has been happening. And, in general, less shopping overall.

Sunday

I have no outside of the home plans today so I didn’t feel like trying much. This T-shirt from Dressed in Lala is one of my faves; I love a charcoal instead of a black these days, and for some reason I genuinely like this dumb smiley face in neon green. As almost-always my jeans are Levi 501s; they are just about perfect as far as I am concerned. (As a 5’3” person, I do order them in short.)

I almost wore my hated (by me) lavender HOKAs but I decided it wasn’t too Christmasy to wear red with the neon green smiley. I feel so much better when I’m wearing my Marni x HOKA shoes even if literally this matters to no one but me.

I keep falling for hats, though in general I don’t have a lot of opportunities to wear them and am always excited when one arises. This one attacked me MULTIPLE TIMES via Instagram ads and eventually wore me down. (Same, actually, with these Dita frames, though I managed to hunt them down on eBay and make a quite low offer, the dream!)

Monday

When I saw that Nooworks had a new print — and a big cat one at that — I stopped by over the weekend to see what I could snag in person. The shirts were all sold out in my size so I ordered a tee, but I did grab this skirt, which I did not yet already have in any prints and love. I am a sucker for a long skirt but also it’s maddening how they need the exact right swing and weight and waistline or I hate them? This is a good one, though.

I almost did some pattern-mixing today but decided to keep it simple with a white boxier tee from Everybody dot World and some AF1 platform hightops (clearanced years ago from a previous season).

Tuesday

I struuuuggggggggled with this dress, actually! I just got this from the big Universal Standard sale — and really like it — but the material/pattern felt a little more Business Dress Shirt than I expected. I really wanted to break up this vibe.

I switched out the matching tie belt for the tie belt from another dress. It’s also a Business Dress Shirt pattern so I like the pairing a lot — so much that the next time I wear the blue striped dress I may use the belt from this dress. I also wore Converse (blue hightop Comme de Garcons that were a Christmas gift a few years ago from my mom) to further dress down the look. What it is really screaming for is a denim jacket, but the weather this week DOES NOT SUPPORT LAYERS.

(I started out with my desert peach (as I believe is their technical color) glasses but they read as the same color as the dress, somehow? And my hair? Too close, at least? It was distracting on Zoom during my hour of therapy this morning. Anyway, I switched out for my aviators. (During therapy, yes.) The glasses dance is a delicate one.)

Wednesday

Another Nooworks dress. This is the Zoey, in Sondler Cat, a print I also have in pants and a puff-sleeve shirt, because this is one of my very favorite prints of theirs. (If you haven’t noticed, all my favorite prints tend to involve big cats.) For some reason I had no idea how to stand while wearing this dress? I’m doing my best.

I know we are always in a socks transitional time, but I am enjoying that visible socks are still around, and am going to take advantage while I can. I am not someone who is trend-chasing but I do like sort of feeling like I’m doing something Of The Times while I’m just wearing all my standard Whatever I Want stuff.

Thursday

I go to the gym on Thursday mornings to lift weights or other things my trainer makes me do so I can become strong enough to lift a car off of a cat if need arises, etc. Last week she made me do something called The Devil’s Bookshelf which sounds like what the book banners call the LGBTQ+ section of a library. MY POINT IS I have to pack my Thursday outfit into a gym bag, so I always try to make it easy.

Today’s is the Cassie from Nooworks, which is like if the Joyce met the Naomi. However I’m not sure I like it. I’ve worn it a few times, and every time I’m like… ehhhh? In these cases I like to give an outfit its last hurrah. I think I’ll probably part with this via the Nooworks preowned portal. Why don’t I love it? I literally have no idea, but my closet is too full (the closet rod has collapsed multiple times until I had to replace it with a metal one AND I took my closet doors off to give me even more access) to hang onto things I don’t LOVE.

(What I do love? Of course, my HOKA x Marnis. They take care of me.)

Friday

The other year I was at an indie bookstore association event in the PNW and I saw a woman wearing an incredible dress. I made a beeline to find out where it was from, and she was excited to tell me it was from…SHEIN. Ohhhh cool cool cool.

Look, I am not in the business of telling others how to live their lives (ANYMORE I USED TO BE A MUCH MORE ANNOYING PERSON) but I personally don’t shop at Temu or Shein, et al. I try to cap how many pieces I’ll buy from other fast fashion. I know these are not choices everyone can make, so, this is just a me thing.

But anyway I could NOT stop thinking about this dress. So I searched Poshmark. There was only one of this dress on the whole site. And it was in my size! And it was $11! Anyway. There you have it. Sometimes magic happens.

(This dress doesn’t have pockets and it’s def too long so, you know, only so much magic.)

Saturday

I had an event today in San Diego, so it was a great excuse to wear this Nooworks dress in the Princess cut, which for me is just like… a little too dressy for my dayjob? I love this print so much, and I also like that it’s long enough that I didn’t think too hard about footwear and just threw on the good HOKAs because I didn’t know how much walking I’d have to do on the University of San Diego campus (turned out not much but I like being comfortable regardless OBVIOUSLY).

I got a lot of compliments on the dress today, including a woman who said, “not just the dress, but the courage to wear it!” Ummm there are things that require courage, and this is not one of them!! Also way to undercut the compliment, no matter what you meant, lady! For the record, there is literally nothing brave about me, a person who is afraid of aquariums.

---

Have a nice week, everyone. What are you excited about wearing??

---