'People are fickle things' - said some great philosopher at some point, presumably. If not, here I am saying such a thing & today feels like an appropriate time to say it - on a grey, unassuming Friday afternoon with me feeling a little aimless but nevertheless writing a blog that just reached 1000 views(!) & which I often thought I wouldn't persevere with. These days evoke the seemingly endless ones I would spend after handing in my final essays with nothing much to do aside from cleaning the bathroom & watching the dregs of BBC iPlayer. It's remarkable how easily my mind can forget my exasperation at the length of a demanding working week & resign myself to the frustrated listlessness of not having made any plans. The same is also true of the weather of the last seven days, a lunch hour spent cross-legged on my coat by Hampstead pond soon seemingly impossible as I, the following day, retreat to the basement to avoid eating soggy sandwiches.
I've even found this sense of restlessness extend to my wardrobe lately, very few of my clothes really feeling particularly 'me' & realising that I've not bought any new clothes for a very long time. While hunting for midi skirts & big knits in charity shops is one of my favourite pastimes of a weekend (...or lunch break), my penchant for thrifting has also meant that I've acquired a handful of bad habits as well as floral blouses, namely buying clothes impulsively & often several sizes bigger than will fit me without being belted at my waist. This has, I realised only recently, cultivated a warped sense of my body shape which has changed considerably since I all but gave up eating meat & I've had to grudgingly ditch a lot of size 14 or 16 skirts & trousers that don't fit or flatter. Allowing myself to be unduly influenced by a lot of the blogs that I read & the Instagram pictures that I like, I've also lost sight of my own sense of style which culminated in a fundamentally misguided & wholly unsuccessful trip to Regent Street's otherwise wonderful '& Other Stories'. It was in this exasperated state that I decided to make my usual trip to Sainsbury's via my neighbourhood 'Beyond Retro' on Saturday & see whether the familiar smell of beesting cake from their cafe & musty would-be wedding dresses would be enough for inspiration to strike & strike it did, in the form of this little sunflower smock.
Tote from Alphabet Bags
Sitting just above my knee with a pretty, criss-crossed tie at the front & a striking sunflower print, it has, if temporarily, soothed my dress despair & proved that I often I know myself better than I think. I call it my Ginsberg dress after my favourite poem that he wrote in 1955 & which I often read in times of doubt:
'We're not our skin of grime, we're not our dread
bleak dusty imageless locomotive, we're all
beautiful golden sunflowers inside,
we're blessed by our own seed
& golden hairy naked accomplishment'
Aside from spinning in circles in aforementioned dress, this afternoon I've mostly been flipping through my
boyfriend's copy of the latest Granta magazine all about Japan (a part of the world that I know very little
about but about which I have grown very curious of late) & reading up on recipes for the week ahead,
namely from one of my favourite vegetarian blogs Vegetarian Ventures & a more recent discovery via the lovely 'Oh Comely' magazine, vegan veteran Guac & Roll. I've also been wistfully researching availability at probably the coolest hotel in Berlin for an early summer holiday & feeling grateful to my 'Shakespeare &
Co.' newsletter for introducing me to this wonderful illustrated version of Frank O'Hara's 'Having a Coke
Is anyone else looking forward to another episode of 'The Trip to Italy' this evening too? I am likely Steve Coogan's biggest fan but the first series failed to hold my attention - this time around it has got my belly aching (not only due to the good looking food, either) & willing to drop everything & elope to the Amalfi Coast - any takers?
What else're you doing to avoid our belated April showers?
Speak soon - O.
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