I Suppose I Could be a Candidate for "What Not To Wear"

So yesterday I saw "The Devil Wears Prada" and it got me to thinking about my sense of fashion. Or as most people would see it, the extreme lack thereof. I have never been the type of dresser that other people particularly admire. Oh, they might like the color of my shirt, but I set absolutely no trends. Unless you call the "thrown together from the bottom of the closet and pray they aren't too wrinkled" look a trend.

I always wonder if it has anything to do with the fact that I wore uniforms every year of my schooling until I hit college. If you squint over at my picture, you can see the pointy, triangular collar and oh-so-chic plaid suspenders that comprised the upper portion of my grade school uniform. Once in a while, I got really daring and switched the pointy collar for a cutting-edge Peter Pan collar. Don't go calling me timid!

I think the only time I got to wear regular clothes during my grade school and middle school years was on the weekend. I was a fairly active young lady, and while I wouldn't label myself a tomboy, I was not a girly girl either. I cared what I looked like, I just liked being able to have clothes on that were comfortable and let me move if that's what I wanted to to. I would gussy up for special occasions, but those were few and far between. Even church wasn't a big deal, since we always attended five-thirty Mass on Saturday night, and you could totally get away with wearing cordouroys and a shirt. Think late seventies, people.

Then I hit high school and I attended an all girls high school and had absolutely no one to impress on a daily basis. The shirts were the same type as described earlier, with the same thrilling collar choices, but we had very matronly grey wool skirts that went down past our knees and were required to wear penny-loafers. Either navy blue or dark brown, if I remember correctly. Add to that crested navy blazers and you have your typical private school look.

Out of school, I had this sort of weird schism. One one hand, I was very alternative and New-Ro and aspired to wear things that were black and dramatic. On the other hand, I was a "serious" volleyball player, and my everyday wadrobe consisted of volleyball shorts and T-shirts that tied in very closely to beach/surf wear. So during the day on Saturday you could find me roaming around in patterned Burmys or Club shorts along with a Quicksilver T-shirt. Fast forward to the dance on Saturday night, and I would have on a black and white paisley button-down flared shirt, (buttoned all the way up, of course) black stretch pants and weird pointy black shoes. To go along with my weird pointy hair, which is a whole other story.

Over time, my look evolved into a very preppy one. It must have been those four years of that crested blazer. And lo and behold, preppy is pretty dang comfortable. I still prefer to dress that way when I care about what I look like, with button down shirts, (no longer buttoned all the way up) khakis, capris, loafers and such. When I don't care, you are liable to find me in cropped black yoga pants, some kind of hopefully matching shirt and tennis shoes.

So I am in no way someone you could label a fashionista, even though I am pretty aware of all the designers and trends. I'm going to call it maturity that I don't get too swayed by those "must have" items. But it's probably just a combination of jealousy and poverty.