Fashion Musings

When I was in the sixth grade, our school had 50s day. My mom got on her sewing machine and whipped up a billowy yellow cotton below the knees skirt that I wore over multiple petticoats of scratchy netting and paired with a plaid shirt, bobby socks, and penny loafers. I wore a ponytail and my Dad's letter jacket, which smelled like the garage and came down to my knees. I think I tolerated those petticoats for an hour, tops.

"Everything comes back in style eventually," I remember my mother musing.

"Even bell bottoms?" I asked in horror (remember, the 80s were all about pegged jeans, a throwback to the 50s).

"Yes, even bell bottoms."

And sure enough, in the 90s, somewhere in the midst of my college years, bell bottoms were back.

As is seemingly the case for fashion resurgences, the 80s tiptoed in. For me, it was apparent when one of my friends remarked that my striped, spandex, off the shoulder shirt with the big white plastic buckle was way too Pat Benatar. Whatever. I wore it to Numbers, paired with hip hugger flared jeans.

Despite this, my first reaction to these shifts is typically to balk. After all, I remember the 80s. And they were, for the most part, ugly. Especially the late 80s into the early 90s. Yuck.

That said, I like wearing earrings that I've had since high school. Let me tell you, that Caboodles I had stashed away was a veritable time capsule that yielded lots of forgotten treasures.

I like boots, too. A lot.

I'm skinny enough to wear the tight jeans, thanks to the gym and my various neuroses.

Tights do wonders for my legs.

Stuff I personally can't take include (but are certainly not limited to): Gladiator sandals, tights on their own (wear a skirt or some goddamned pants, PLEASE. That is too much ass, even if you weigh 90 pounds, and in New York winter, it's dumb), the small billed Panama hats as well as those Oliver Twist styled hats (let's face it, I really hate the hats), pastel colored pumps paired with dark tights.

And things have, perhaps, gone too far. On more than one occasion, I've snidely noted that Williamsburg is the capital of bad fashion. And maybe that's unfair; this section of Brooklyn boasts some really great thrift shops and boutiques as well as lots of open-minded people who are free enough to express themselves without feeling self-conscious about it.

But retro is never entirely retro, is it? No, it's bits and pieces from the past with a right now kind of spin. And I realize that 2009 fashion is all those bits and pieces, the good and the bad from the 80s arranged in an anything goes kind of way.

It's definitely kind of liberating. I like not having to obsess about what on earth I'm going to wear with those magenta shoes - because I can wear them with ANYTHING.

That's right. Anything. Random shit from my closet. Fuck it, just throw it on. It'll work. Maybe it'll even make a statement.

I've been thinking about all of this haphazardness for a while and two theories have emerged from all the muck in my cranial cavity.

Theory 1: Recession. Take the pressure off, wear what you have. That green golf shirt you bought for a buck from Goodwill will work great with a pink dotted swiss sarong, a brown concho belt, purple tights with orange tulips and those sweet little Keds that are soooo 1986. Don't worry about costly pants and skirts, the tights'll do!

Theory 2: It's all the fault of Generation X. Gen X was all about irony. A Gen X'er wore some kid's cast off softball shirt precisely because it wasn't made for her, it was someone else's, part of someone else's life. A Gen Y'er buys a softball shirt at Urban Outfitters because I'd argue that a Gen Y'er wouldn't recognize irony if her life depended on it because she grew up with Gen X irony. To Generation Y, irony equals actuality.

As for me, in the spirit of being financially responsible, I'm shopping my closet more than ever these days, which has helped me to remember where I was and how I saw myself - while I attempt to put a new spin on something tried and true (or not).