Day Two

Testing, one two! 

Weather is a child. It plays with you, messes with you and just when you think it has had its fun it goes and makes a public mockery with you. 

I think it kindly realised that I was wearing a bra with straps that stick out, so it insisted on me staying desperately in my jersey to hide this and boots as a small compromise for as my bare legs and their overgrownness (in need of a shave) rustled, quite literally, in the wind.

Hats are no obstacles for wind, nor are dresses apparently. We did Shelley's "Ode to the West Wind" in english today which makes my life very poetic, what with Shelley describing the clouds and the oceans and me describing my white white hot pants and hairy legs and shrieks.

And if you, like my aunt are asking what about the "shoe(ness)" (that was all her!) then look no further! Here are the two items which kept me alive on this windy autumnish day.

(The hat is on an original Yoighänder Bessa I, which is a prop of fun in my res room. It points towards a giant block of cheese stuck on the wall, and why that is there is a whole other story, for a whole other blog. Check it out on www.andartattacksagain.blogspot.com/2011/01/choice-notes.html .)

These are my amazing black boots. They are soft. They are comfy. They lace up. They take me everywhere. (They are from Aldo if you want a pair. (Cavendish Mall, Cape Town to be exact).)

So today I was nearly cold, did the whole varsity thing, did the whole free arm band for student night thing, and the whole go-to-granny-for-lunch thing only to find out that she was not there and I didn't have my key and so I had to listen to her neighbour disgruntle at the weeping oak tree thing. And then I did the whole grocery thing, the whole supper thing and the whole plan thing.

Now I'm doing the dress thing to do the dance thing, at the thing called Tiger.

(This is the thing- Fink).

Day One

It's all about the......dress.

It is day one of lent here, Ash Wednesday, and I am on my way (-ish. I haven't been fetched yet) to St. Andrew's service down in good old Newlands. (Will try snap a picture on  my lousy 2MP Blackberry camera, no flash. Don't rely on that being a success story!)

Going to get ash crossed on my forehead, say my prayers and hope above all hopes that I will come out of this A CONQUERER! (tadaaah! -and that's not TADA (Teenagers Against Drug Abuse for those people who's crescendo into life has also been ruined because of a silly school society.))

So the reason. For the blackness. And the simpleness. Of the dressness. (And speaking of the suffix "-ness". I think it's wonderful. It adds emotion to every object, every thing suddenly is said with love, all by suffixizing (my own little neologism there, my english tutor would be so proud) a once-ordinary word. 

I have even changed the name of a friend of mine because of this. It's interesting to see how something so seemingly insignificant can change the whole way you view some thing....for instance, he hates it. And I? I love him all the more for it.)

Why oh why oh why?

What is the point? Well. a.) Style. It's a self-reflective, wish fulfilling, happy-maker materialistic completely superficial thing that I love. b.) Society makes us follow society. Like it or not, we do it. We know to wear X, not wear Y and if wearing both X and Y to do Z. I'm not saying we all follow fashion, no. We don't. 

Exhibit A. (For Nicole).

c.) So every day we, and the other 6.9 billion people, decide what to wear. Sure, we justify this by activities and weather and and and. And everyone does it. We are all conformists.

I have decided to give up this conforming for lent and to wear the same simple black dress every day and night.

The most important question of course is what does this dress look like? It's the swinging, hair flinging girl in a dress which is me in what is The Dress.

What are the dressfacts of the day?

My roommate and I went to the park below our res, we snapped some pictures. I went to church, now have an ashen cross on my forehead.

All in a all. A good start!

Ash Wednesday

This is not a spiritual blog. 

This is the story of the 40 (well, 46 actually) days during which I will be wearing the same dress. (By the same dress...I mean, I have two. They are identical, but there are two..) 

Black. Simple. Stunning. (And no. That's not me.)

Why?

Well this is where Ash Wednesday comes into play....

I am Anglican. And we Anglican's have weird ol' 'lil traditions. One of which is lent. Now lent is a pretty bizarre fartoolong period during which we give up something that is important in our lives (this mirrors when Jesus was tempted in the desert for 40 days). When ever we crave that thing, we pray. Our faith grows, our self-control grows, we become all rounded but manage to lose all sense of the allroundedness and lo behold, each year we start the cycle again!

So last year, I gave up tea. Side note, I'm a teaholic. I love tea. I drink tea all the time. Earl Grey has a tea named after him, I am convinced that South Africa's "Rooibos" (which means red bush) is in dire need of renaming: Jessie Scheepers. Would you like ceylon tea, Earl Grey , green tea, or Jessie Scheepers? 

It certainly works.

(http://www.designer-daily.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/tea-submarine.jpg This is a submarine that encloses tea leaves and you dip it in your tea to create your own infusion. So very cool!)

Anyway, I gave up tea. And it was hard. So hard. This year I had to beat it.

I decided to give up conforming to fashion. Style is always affected by the current trends, regardless of what anyone says. It's what's available out there...and since most of us don't have time (or even know how) to make our own clothes, we conform. I have given up this weakness and 
I am recreating my individuality.

Here's to the last night of normality!