When I was a kid, we used to play a game called: “finders keepers, spend it right away”, which was a make believe game where we imagined finding large sums of money and having to decide what to do with it. Returning it to its owner or saving it for later were not an option.
The prize I won a few weeks ago reminded me of this, because much to my dismay I had to spend the entire amount in one single shopping spree. There was no possibility of keeping a credit for later. Which meant I had to find $750.00’s worth of clothing in my size and in that one designer’s collection among what was left in that particular store.
I had gone back discreetely to check the clothes out and came to two conclusions: one, none of those garments would ever interest my daughters , so I would have to buy for myself only and second, I could not do this alone, I needed help. So I enlisted the help of a friend who is very fashion conscious and a bit more daring than I am. I figured this was an opportunity to get clothes I would not normally buy for myself.
Well….it took several hours of searching through racks and racks of clothes and trying on an unelievable amount of clothing, my friend running back and forth to and from the fitting room, adding machine in hand to keep track of where we stood money wise…but we succeeded within $5.00 of our allotted amount (and they gave me the extra dollars worth).
I considered taking photos of the garments and putting them up but I am not sure it would be very interesting. I did try on clothes that were too small, a few that were too big, many that just did not fit properly, some in horrid colours ( anything with green in it does NOT work on me)…lots of glittery, sparkly, shimmery stuff… My friend kept urging me to think outside the box so we compromised: I got a rather conventional outfit in chocolate brown and beige consisting of slacks, and a sporty jackets and a two layer top plus a short skirt. But then… I got a leather jacket!!!! A black and white one…now I will need to go back to Paris to ride on that motorcycle again!!! I also got a pair of studded jeans…yes..they are studded with fake stones…I wonded if I will ever gather the nerves to wear them…apparently they are all the rage….but rage at my age??? and what on earth does one wear as a top with that? Those nice indian tunics look comfy but they would hide part of the stones…hmm maybe that’s not such a bad idea…but they all seem to have some beading of their own…is there such a thing as garnish overdose??? There must be rules about beads…wood ones, sea shells, iridescent ones, gold ones, glassy ones, silver ones, small ones, large ones, flat ones, balls, cubes, tubes…and I have not even mentionned embroidery yet!… Then, what about shoes?? Clunky or strappy? Heels or wedge? Navy or gold? (there is no navy to be found this year by the way)…OHH the life of the fashionable!!!! What a challenge!!! Will I need new undies too? and a purse? NO ! purses I have!