Today my beautiful lady has been filled with what I believe are gerbera daisies. Cost for flowers, about $20 @ Trader Joe’s.
I had gerberas in my wedding bouquet by necessity and not choice. Unfortunately my April wedding came to be about two weeks after the ranunculus were spent and gone. I wanted ranunculus, because they have a wind-blown look. I wanted orange, and my sister had an orange dress. We both had our dresses made by Kevin Simon, who seems to have vaporized since she once had a very pricey store on Abbott Kinney Boulevard. Kevin made everything in linen, and she was a master of sort of vintage-farm looking clothing, like late 1800s. I loved her work and could not afford any of it, so I splurged on my dress and my sister’s, assuming I was only getting married once. A regular skirt at Kevin’s was over $500. My wedding dress and my sister’s MOH dress combined were $1000. The back bottom of my dress had tulle orange flowers pinned to it. My dress was linen with a silk slip, and my sister’s was orange silk. I’ve since lost about 70 pounds, and I left the dress at Goodwill in Delaware when I moved, but I kept all the organza flowers.
In any case, I do have to say I’m not usually a gerbera girl, except when needs must. But today the yellow (which is a lot lighter in real life) on the flowers screamed, “Butter!” at me, with just a hint of orange at their centers, and so I was compelled. Mixed them with orange and some green greenery, et voila!
The little pumpkin/squash you see there I plan to eat, not carve. LOL. Roasted pumpkin in things is divine! As are these lovely gerbera. Ranunculus are actually not great cut flowers, so droopy.
It is a blessing to have flowers anywhere in the world, of any kind, and especially on my very sunny kitchen counter. Buy the flowers, hold them high, and repeat after me, “Here’s to the times we bless others, and also to the times we bless ourselves!”
Have a wonderful week~
PS. Most flowers I buy last a full two weeks! Just keep the water clean and fresh.
I have this sense that sometimes I come off as a competent professional, and this post is proof that I’m faking it, just like most people on the web.
This is a photo of me in an outfit I particularly liked last spring, but, if it looks on your screen like it looks on mine, it looks warped. And I don’t know why. I have Photoshop, and mad Photoshop skills (if mad Photoshop skills means I pay for it, and noodle around and do my best, and really have no idea what I’m doing). I don’t know why I look freaking warped, but I can’t be bothered to care, mostly because I love this outfit, and I so badly want it to be chilly, even a little bit for a few hours. So, yes, I am faking any confidence (and proficiency at Photoshop) that you may feel that you see.
It’s times like these that I realize that while I absolutely consider air conditioning to be both a privilege and a blessing, what I consider even more of a privilege and a blessing is some outdoor space to call your own, and nice enough weather to enjoy it. I’m in that awkward phase of life where I am really not too good in The Heat, with capital letters, and also not too good when the temps go below freezing. I was a winter-over-summer fan from birth almost (and aren’t most very pale-skinned people?) and I still am, but not quite as cold as I age. Blech. Aging.
In any case: I bought that green blouse, I don’t remember from where, but it is long-sleeved, a bit cropped, and I love it. Over my (presumably, at the time) chilly shoulders I have an inexpensive sweater shawl/wrap I treated myself to (I think it came from Quince) when we first moved back to CA, which was insane because I probably would have gotten more use out of it on the East Coast, but maybe had less reasons to go out looking dressy enough for a shawl. Are shawls dressy? It seems to me they are. East Coast or West, hot-as-blazes or nicely cold, I have never gotten over my love of corduroy.
When I was going into sixth grade my mother gave me some money, and let me take the trolly to our local mall to buy some school clothes on my own. My mother was a very clothing-controlling mother who “knew” how children were supposed to be dressed, and that often meant clothes I didn’t especially like, like pink or pale peach, and Keds (sorry Keds) and lots of white, and no dark colors. If you got an Easter purse made of some sort of wicker every spring along with your white sweater and a hat with fake flowers on it, your mom may have been like mine. That year I don’t know what had come over her, as she also really liked seeing me try clothes on, and deciding which stores to go into, but she sent me off on my own. I went to the Levi’s store that had floor-to-ceiling bins full of denim and corduroy arranged by waist, and length, and also leg type. I cannot tell you how disappointed I was to hear that they only had straight legs, skinny, and boot cut; bell bottoms had been discontinued the prior fall, they told me. I mean I adored bell bottoms. So sad for me. But they had corduroy, and I had never had corduroy before, so I bought three pairs: one in green and one in a dark rust color, and I think the other pair was deep brown. Needless to say my mother was nonplussed. I remember feeling like middle school, where, for the first time, I would have a different teacher for each class, and move from classroom to classroom like a college student, was the big time. I was ready to learn, baby! (Of course I was. I read the encyclopedia and the atlas. I was a positively thrilling child with my consumption of plays and gothic horror romances. What sixth-grader doesn’t like gothic horror romance?) So I wanted to go to middle school looking collegiate, and for me that was corduroy and fall colors. Flash forward to this spring, and I have been lugging those green corduroy pants (from Gap or Old Navy) around for at least five years!
And, lastly, to finish off this particular ensemble, on my feet was the birthday gift I requested from Sophie and her dad for 2024: green Doc Martens. I had Doc Martens boots in college, but they have gotten so much more comfortable now. I love them. I replaced Doc’s laces with some pretty green ribbon laces, and that completed the look, in my mind.
Here’s to fall colors. I bought Dave a pumpkin spice latte the other day!
You know, one last thought, when I was a K-12 kid, all I thought about and longed for was going to college. I know I was a teensy bit of a dork, but I just cannot stand what it happening to colleges now: Cutting down on diversity (which I loved. I requested a non-white roommate on my college form because I was leaving Wonder-Bread-white Springfield, and wanted to meet some people who were not like me), cutting down on international students, controlling what teachers can teach and what books can be made available. But the most horrible thing is the absolute lie that college is neither good nor necessary. I had teachers with different morals and beliefs and ideas than me, and I liked them just as much as the ones who were more similar to me in my thinking, and I loved them all (except for that one Irish poet who refused to pass women, which I’m sure is here somewhere in a past post). And learning new things is important. You cannot do it all on your own, and you have to read to do it, and you have to care about knowing things. I tend to be a very trusting person, but I also always wanted to check the source before I changed or confirmed my thinking on a topic. I wished, so much, that I could have had time in my program to learn more languages, and to take subjects that weren’t related to my degree, and that were tough for me, like physics, which continues to fascinate me, and automotive repair (I wanted to learn how to fix car engines). September is the month of school, and fall, and new things to learn, and the circus of idiots in leadership of the federal government at the moment should have their brains washed out with soap for their absolute hatred of college. College is not easy, but it is a wonderful experience that every American child should be encouraged to pursue, and supported to pursue (use my tax dollars to pay for college please, and not to give Tesla a tax break!).
So, in the spirit of fall, and going back to school, and wishing, in vain, that it was cool enough for corduroy, and that I was young enough to be a college student all over again, here is my head-to-toe green outfit. If only the pants were bell-bottoms! If only college were life-long and free. If only we had time, and resources, to do it all. I would stay busy.
What was a class that you took in K-12 or college that you still remember fondly? I loved choir, geometry, home ec (cooking) in middle school, and still remember some of the recipes, and literary criticism, the Vietnam War (which went with a PBS series), and black and white photography in college.
Today my beautiful lady head is holding pincushion protea, safflower, and eucalyptus. When I was younger I was more snooty about flowers: they had to smell, and smell good. None of these really have a smell, although fresh (really fresh) eucalyptus can smell wonderful. Cost for flowers, again about $11 at Trader Joe’s.
I venture to say I’ve almost made it through summer, always a challenge for me as a person who prefers chillier climes. My sister reports that up (up the hill) in Idyllwild where she lives now it has been chilly and stormy… of which I am envious as we’ve had a 90-100 degree heat wave here. It’s been a bit of a year so far, her dealing with a diagnosis of mucosal melanoma, and me dealing with her diagnosis. We’ve done the majority of her doctor’s appointments together, and although I know she sometimes must get sick of me, I really have treasured spending all that time with my baby sis. She was supposed to go visit our handful of a mother, but there were new protocols to try, so that got cancelled. She’s hoping our mother will come to her. I am not holding my breath on that because the mountain usually doesn’t go to Mohammed.
I now present an actual undoctored video of Mama:
Ha!
No, that’s not actually her, but the “everything” about Lucille is pretty close to Mama Pearce. And… if I tease out the comparison… I’m probably Michael in that scenario, who is probably the lamest Bluth. Sorry Michael. I have to tell the truth… on both of us!
As long as I have been a parent I have been worried about my daughter’s summer plans/schedule, because she’s a kid who does better with one than without. She was too old for any camps this year, so we just made a deal: she took an online Driver’s Ed course; she had to make plans with one friend at least once a week, and she did some new and interesting chores around the house in preparation for someday being in charge of her own dorm room or apartment. She mopped, and organized, and did all sorts of things she doesn’t have a lot of time for when school is in session, because her program has days that run from 8-5, but can go as late as 9. She’s joined a teen program at Pasadena Playhouse for the fall, where she’ll begin to get a little real-world backstage experience. And she passed the driver’s ed course. We’re waiting for the necessary pink slip to arrive in the mail, which will allow her to take the permit test (it is a rule in California that they have the pink slip before they take the permit test.).
Anyway, it’s been a busy few months, and I’m glad school has begin again, and the patterns are falling back into place that alleviate some of the the pressure. Is there a mom out there in a hetero relationship whose partner takes on the responsibility for the kid(s) over the summer?
🦗 🦗 🦗 🦗 🦗
Are those… crickets?
Yeah, I didn’t think so.
When life comes in waves of responsibility and busyness, you STILL have to manage to get to the ever more expensive grocery store (wait, I thought he was lowering the prices on day 1…. Good thing none of us held our breath), so skip a few of the overpriced boxes of cereal, or other overpriced things, and make sure you use ten bucks or so to buy yourself flowers!
These flowers I love because… orange, and green, the two best colors ever.
Today my beautiful lady head is holding iris and Veronica. I once saw neighbors rip up an enitre patch of iris and throw them away I asked if I could have them, but they said no because they didn’t like them, so they didn’t want to see them anywhere. Can you imagine? They put in something foul, like geraniums. When I return from the temporary status as renter back to home owner, iris are absolutely in the plan. Veronica I wasn’t aware of until this year, which is painful to admit. They are absolutely brilliant flowers, long lasting, straight and tall with sometimes a graceful curve to them. They’re a real eye-catcher. A friend once took a plant pot filling class, and was told that if you plant a pot you should have a filler, and spiller, and a thriller. Veronica is the thriller. Cost for flowers, about $11 at Trader Joe’s. Also pictured… future Chex mix!
A gazillion years ago now I spotted a pair of madras pants at a Goodwill. Man, I wanted them. Unfortunately, based on their size or mine, it wasn’t happening. I remember standing there, thinking, What sewing skills can I unleash to make these work? I do have sewing skills, and they are universally unimpressive, so there’s that. I talked myself out of them, which was a good idea, but I’ve been longing for them ever since.
Facebook puts clothing ads up in my feed all the time. It knows me, and, in this case, I don’t mind, because here came a golf store (last month) with a huge sale on men’s madras pants. Score! Now, what the hell do you wear with madras pants if you don’t golf, and you don’t want to look more dork than usual? T-shirts just seemed to add to the wrong vibe, so I went with this shirt, from Old Navy, I think, during the pandemic, and I believe it is a women’s shirt, because it is a petite, as you can tell because it doesn’t come down to below my butt. I am short, really short, so short my favorite HS teacher called me Shorty instead of my name, and my waist is also short. And, while I’m outing myself, I might as well go all the way and reveal that, also during HS, the costume lady informed me that my arms are shorter than they’re supposed to be, which explains a lot of yoga challenges, and why my daughter says I am a T-Rex. Add into all that my usual chest size of 38D, and it’s been a work-in-progress, sometimes, to find what I want, like a good men’s shirt to wear with ties that fits waist and boobs, and this petite version does the trick so well that you cannot imagine how carefully I launder it. This shirt has to last me to death, folks, and I ain’t planning on going anytime soon.
Lastly the tie is, like all my ties, from Goodwill, but, until today, it had been living in my closet, unworn, for probably 8 or more years. Listen, I commit to clothes I love. I think it works with the slightly preppy vibe.
I have on Seavees sneakers, and, pro tip, every August Seavees has a massive online sale on most of their sneakers that is often 50% off, which these were. They are not as comfy as Vans, IMHO, but they do have that retro beach feel. I have had this pair about five years, bought on sale one August. I am obsessed with my favorite color, green, and really have to hold myself back from buying nothing but green clothes.
Dave has off today, and is sleeping in. I got up (even though I was up late, one!) at my usual pre-6 time, mostly because I was sooo hot, which was, I think, not a function of the weather, but more of the time of life, and had to get in a nice cool shower. Then I thought I would try to wear these pants, and put this look together, and took Oliver for a walk so he wouldn’t bother Dave. As we were heading back we pulled ourselves over to make room for another pedestrian, and we said hello, and she said, “I love your look!” So, you know, I’m pretty much on cloud 9 right now: day slayed. I only dress for me, so that I think, OMGosh, woman, I love it! and tell myself how clever I am. But, having another person comment, before 7 in the morning too, is a great surprise.
These pants are comfy, and got looser just on the walk, which was nice. They have four pockets too, cool, as I often walk with my hands in my back pockets for some reason. I’m all in on the pants, and also happy to be undercutting that golf, country club thing. Golfers… I just don’t know. Someone out there is giving golfing a very bad reputation these days. You know what I’m talking about. Imagine how authors would feel if I golfed instead of helping them edit and sell their books! So Ima sit my madras butt down on the porch before Los Angeles gets scorching at noon, and do some editing. And if it needs saying again, there are no riots here. Just hot days and hard-working people being nice to each other. Los Angeles is one of the best places to merge onto the highway, because they’re nice here. I mean, you know, I’m from Philly. I can drive freaking anywhere in the world because I could easily merge onto the Schuylkill Expressway from the left lane, coming down a ramp into the fast lane at 65. It’s a thing. Los Angeles is so much more forgiving. So, yeah, if you like nice weather, really nice, 9 or more months of the year (a teensy bit too hot other times), if you like happy people to interact with at stores and on the street, if you like diversity for your kids and your own general weirdness, and a more chill vibe overall, and especially if you like international food, this is a pretty good place to be. And if you want some super soft comfortable pants with lots of pockets that could, truly, go with almost anything, get some madras. Geek out!
Back when Target was still DEI-cool, I bought myself this head planter. I never quite had the right plant to put in it though, and I decided to use it as a vase instead. I especially like the way the flowers come out the the head and look almost like hair, or a fancy hat.
I buy myself flowers. All the time. I buy them at least twice a month, depending on how long they last. I admit to really loving them and not wanting to throw them away or compost them until they’re really spent. Today I went into my local Vons (I usually get pretty and inexpensive flowers from Trader Joe’s, but they had nothing interesting a few days ago when I stopped in for half and half.), and found these cool tie-dyed roses. I thought they were perfect for celebrating Pride. I’m straight and cis, and a very much in support of Pride, and trans rights, and gay marriage, and all that good stuff. And I love flowers, and fun, colorful, or heavily-scented , off-beat, exotic, just about any kind. (Except geraniums, but that’s a post for another day!)
I just thought these were so pretty and uplifting.
My mother has always considered flowers a waste of money, which seems too sad to me. This bunch of roses and the yellow “filler” cost me ten dollars. That means I’m spending around about 20 bucks a month for a little hit of joy every time I walk into my perpetually untidy kitchen.
Get yourself some flowers and enjoy the color. This is your one life: make it beautiful. Don’t wait for someone else to do it.
I have been taking photos of myself in clothes (lucky for us all! Not naked!) because I love clothes, and I figured I could be brave enough to share that side of myself which you would not know unless you knew me in person.
I also snap a lot of photos of pets, flowers, and, when she lets me, my kid, so the phone gets pretty full. I finally got around to downloading a bunch, and here, for my second (?) clothes post is what I wore back in March to the Atlanta Writer’s conference. It’s a Lucy and Yak Ragan, and my, what are they? Snake? Leopard? I think snake, boots. and some sory of cropped black sweater.
Having been a fat woman for most of my adult life, I often go black in professional situations because it feels safer, cleaner, slimmer. This L&Y Ragan is a USA size 10, as an FYI, so I think I’m down in average size for that, not plus, but I still see me as large, too large, and probably always will.
It was a wonderful day, though, as I had someone come sit at my table with me:
The moment I met Emilie I was in big-time girl love. LOL. Emilie and I are in the same age range, and that’s all anyone needs to know abut that, and she is a person who, the moment we saw each other in person, I felt like I’d known forever. So, even though we’d worked together for many months, to meet her and just hang out was so much fun. Honestly, and I know this is going to sound really dorky to say, but when I work on a book with an author I get really attached to the book, well, because usually I had to likethe book a lot to begin with to want t publish it, and then, because I am a gigantic super-nerd, I am very very excited when I get to meet the author in person. I didn’t ask Emilie for her autograph on her book, but I wanted to. I was really sorry to leave Atlanta. I wished I could have hung out the rest of the week with Emilie. Does anyone else out there feel like there’s never enough time for connection and just fun? Back on the plane, and, that week, home to a huge amount of chaos as an exchange student had come while I was in Atlanta, and the exchange student was a delight, but she was only staying for a week, and it happened to be the same week (the school, IMHO, arranged it badly) the kids the vsiting students were staying with all had all their midterm stuff due, and my chronically procrastinating child was losing her mind when I arrived back in the house, much to the chagrin of the poor the exchange student. So Mom was on immediate duty, and, oh, how I thought back fondly on hanging out with Emilie. Being a mom to my daughter is one of the best joys in my life, but it is not lost on me that when you become a spouse, and then a parent, you are giving up most of your allowance of fun. So you have to get it in where you can. I would love to escape to Atlanta with Emilie again, or anywhere. She felt like a lifelong friend right away, and she’s also an interesting and talented author.
And, I veered a bit off of my outfit, but, what can I say? I’m a veerer.
It’s getting dark outside as I write this, and I have the door open. We live one block off of the restaurant street, and sometimes, like tonight, there are people who are rambunctious in the street. I’ve heard yelling, some fireworks, sirens, dogs barking. Everyone wants to be seen, to matter, to have some attention, and we get squeezed too thin sometimes, and we get loud, when we get a chance to have some fun, to loosen up the reigns. Everyone is guilty of some loud times, but the breeze and the temperature are too nice to allow a little noise to make me close the door. Whever you are, I hope it’s a nice, if slightly loud, spring evening. Sleep tight.
One thing you might not know about me is that I love clothes. Absolutely love them, and (usually) like getting dressed. I have had, throughout my long life, mixed success in this area, largely due, IMHO, to the size I was wearing at any given time. I have fought my weight for most of my adult life, but, long before I knew it was something I needed to fight, people were telling me I needed to: my mother made comments, especially when my two best friends in HS also turned out to be… not skinny. My mother and my sister were skinny, so my mom was flummoxed about where my “trouble” came from. So she often said things to me about my weight, mostly asking, like a person new to this planet, why I thought I was heavy, and where it came from. If only she had voiced that question while looking in a mirror, she’d have found her answer looking at her. And then there were my two Irish grandmas, who looked as potato-fed as they were. So, why was weight trouble for me? Anxiety from my narcissistic mom, and genetics. No one else in my family ever said anything, and certainly not my size 22 grandmas, but there were others. I remember the gym teachers in HS, male and female, told me I was very pretty, and I just needed to lose 20 pounds. I believe I weighed 118 then; I hadn’t yet begun to stress eat enough to be considered self-medicating. I know I hated gym, and never spoke to gym teachers if I didn’t have to, so the fact that 2 from each gender felt the need to tell me I was attractive and losing weight could make me more so is, I now see, weird. But when you feel guilty (I am guilty for being too large) you often don’t realize inapproprate behavior. Between them and my mother I was taught that my weight was a problem before I saw it as one. I don’t think I’ll ever make it to 118 again in this lifetime (at least not while healthy), but I have done many things to try and get smaller. I’m going to say that I feel better smaller too, which is not to accept body-shaming or anything like that. I am, and have always been, petite, short, short legs, short waist, small bones. In HS when I bought my class ring it was a size 5, so skinny fingers (although now the joints are a bit lumpy). It feels better in my body to be smaller in pounds. And with a smaller body I can buy more fitted clothing that suits me better. Even though there are a lot of stores that carry clothes for larger female bodies, they are often not scaled for a petite person: the legs are too long, the waist is too long, the sleeves are too long, the shoulders too broad. They expect a larger woman to be large in height, in bone structure, shoes size 9 or higher, just all-around large. I remember my mother telling me I could wear big flowery prints because I was large, when I thought the opposite was true, but the stores agreed with her, and often the prints are gigantic. To be a combo of large and petite is really hard when trying to find clothes.
How did I get “large” to begin with? I think now, looking back, it was anxiety that I could neither rid myself of, or live with. It had to go somewhere, and it went into my stomach where it gnawed, and I was simply trying to give it something else to chew on. Not being a sweets person, that usually meant a second sandwich. Too much pasta really took up space, and gave the anxiety hours of distraction, much like my dog with a chew. These things worked on the uncomfortable feelings, but stretched my body.
In any case, I love clothes, and I love getting dressed. Though I have worked from home exclusively since just after the pandemic, I still get up and shower and dress and fix my hair, every day. And put on shoes usually too. I know some people won’t wear shoes in their house that they wear outside of their house, but shoes are part of the outfit, my friends.
In this photo I am wearing the first jumpsuit, coverall, whatever you want to call it that I’d ever bought for myself. It’s from Wildfang, and I am wearing it with an old Old Navy sweater in sort of an acid yellow, with my yellow specs, yellow socks, and my beloved Basquiat Pez Dispenser Doc Martens that Dave and Sophie got me for my birthday a few years back. I tend to keep clothes I love a long time. I have a pair of Bass Weejuns from 1983 (that I have had resoled at least three times), and they’re probably my oldest article of clothing.
So when I get dressed, though I’m often not going anywhere, and no one sees me but me and the fam (and the fam has long ago stopped noticing me), I still do it. And I do it, like the weightloss, 100% for me. Now that we’ve settled in our little rented house I’m back to running too, which I do alone, and also just for me. I’d love to be able to get back to doing a 5K again, and, hopefully, with a less embarrassing time. In the future. Not today. But for today I also have with me, in the photo, tied with Oliver the Dog for my most ardent fan, Patrick, the fluffy alergen who loves me. I am willing to swear he can actually say “Mom.” Pets don’t care what I am wearing, or how much their hair messes with the outfit. This fluffy white fellow here has recently had a haircut, and is still fairly fluffy. He was a gift from my crazy cat lady brother, and he loves me like my brother did, which is awesome as I miss my brother, gone some years now, still almost every day. So, from time to time I’ll post something I have on that I particularly like, as I get more used to seeing photos of me, and having other people see them too. And I’ll always know that Patrick thinks I look, as my brother would have said, “Marvelous.”
Dianne Pearce Writes 