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| My Christmas dress. A sum total of £2.50 from a local Autumn Fair, get in! |
I recently went to a 80's disco dressed as a member of Guns n Roses, complete with massive curly wig, ripped and faded denim jeans, cowboy boots and tattoo sleeves. Nobody knew who I was! It wasn't the wig, it was my legs. I hadn't realised that nobody had seen them as separate entities for quite a number of years. It got me thinking that it could be the perfect disguise for me, if I wanted to get up to no good under cover of darkness, I'd just have to don a track suit and I'd be able to get up to all sorts of mischief unrecognised.
My lack of trousers isn't because I'm making a grand statement against feminism, nothing so thoughtful. It's just that trousers don't suit me. They make me feel fat and uncomfortable.
Before my first pregnancy I was a jeans for every occasion kinda girl. Unfortunately when I was 30 weeks I was diagnosed with a blood clot (DVT) in the femoral artery of my left leg. It swelled up to twice it's usual size, looked like an elephant's and I could barely bend it, let alone try and squish it into a pair of skinny jeans. After a prolonged course of injections into my tummy (not fun when you're expecting) my leg eventually started to return to normal. But I think that feeling stayed with me. Wearing trousers just reminded me of that excruciatingly painful, trapped blood feeling. Yeah, given the choice, I'll pass on that one, thanks, if it's all the same...
It's strange how women associate wearing a dress with dressing up. I have outfits that I think make me look a real scruff, but because they're dresses people assume I'm making an effort. I've also had more than a couple of conversations with people who've said something along the lines of "but you always wear heels don't you?" Erm, nope! Flats, wellies, converse, I wear them all, but somehow it's just my frocks that get remembered.
People often say things like "You're always in a dress, I just couldn't be bothered" this makes me laugh every time. I'm lazy! I am so lazy I can't even be bothered to find a top and trousers that go together, I'd rather bung on a dress and its job done.
Now I'm not suggesting that (even for me) there isn't a time and a place for trousers, I'll dig out a pair if it's snowy for example, it'd be bonkers to only rely on tights for warmth in the snow. And if I'm, say, digging up my allotment, again out come my kecks. The cheeky old goat on the next allotment plot to ours once accused me of floating around the place like Margo Leadbetter. I think he thought he was being quite cutting, I couldn't have been more chuffed!
I have my comfy dresses for curling up in, warm day dresses, chilly day dresses, dresses for fat days, thin days and I hope I don't see anyone I know days. They're me. They're what I feel happiest in.
Do you have a 'go-to' item of clothing that you feel most at home in? Are you known for how you dress? What's YOUR thing?
