As fabulous as I am, a blog does require a little bit more than daily photos of what some random girl who owns a lot of black clothing. So, I’m going to start actually talking about fashion. On a fashion blog. Who would have expected that?
And, as a fashion blog, there is no way I’m going to escape talking about this at some point, so I might as well get this subject over with: Uggs.
I know, I know, everyone who is even vaguely aware of current fashion has at some point either worn a pair of Uggs or made fun of someone wearing Uggs. You don’t want to hear “These are some stupid looking boots” one more time. But you’ve got to understand something. This isn’t just a new fad to me. This is something I grew up with, and something I never expected to get popular.
As long as I can remember, my mother has looked very much the same. She’s gotten grayer in recent years, the grey racing stripes in dark blonde hair turning into white stripes in gray hair. I have great hopes for getting a silver stripes at one point, but given my tendency to dye my hair, I doubt that it will really be noticeable. I’ve always said, if you dye your hair blue and purple, then no one will be able to tell when you turn gray. Then again, this is usually avoided unless one has excellent job security. Although it is very difficult to fire a housewife or an ecumenical speaker, my mother has never taken me up on my offer to help her dye her racing stripes purple, and her appearance remains unchanged.
Striped hair drawn into a bun, a long-sleeved blouse and a long peasant skirt, usually with trim at the bottom. Then, striped cotton stockings in the colors of the blouse and skirt, and a pair of uggs. The end result is that my mother looks something like either Mrs. Claus or a lawn gnome. That doesn’t sound very flattering. She pulls it off, in a sort of an old-world sweet old lady sort of way. It’s hard to look particularly ethnic when one is sort of English and mainly really, really white; but she manages. The only other person I ever saw wearing Uggs until I was eighteen years old was Conan the Barbarian. Of course, in my terribly intricate child mind this did not mean that my mother dressed like Conan, but that Conan dressed like my mother. Perhaps that’s why I was never that impressed with him. Or maybe it was because I was exposed to more of the comics and movies and less of the books, I don’t know. So if these boots could make Conan look like a sweet little old lady, imagine what happened when they became a fad for young girls.
Young girls with implausible tans, bleached hair, thin, dark eyebrows, tiny little shorts and my mother’s boots. I first noticed them in Boston when my father was in the hospital, usually wearing a large down jacket or vest to make up for their lack of pants. Now, I’m not about to give someone a hard time for the small shorts big boots look. Combat boots and cutoffs are a classic, less than practical combination. But combat boots are actually shaped like feet. I’m sure, that to the daughters of soldiers, seeing me wear their father’s boots is just as confusing as me seeing them with my mother’s.
Sometimes, to complete the “Sweet little old lady” look, you will see these boots with the sheepskin accented in folksy embroidered designs or replaced with cable knitting. I appreciate a good sweater as much as the next girl, in fact probably more than some, but I do not claim to understand the thought process between combining Conan the Barbarian and knitting. Maybe he saved some sheep on the Isle of Wight, and the farmers made him some nice boot cozies to say thanks.
I will not even broach the subject of the Uggs covered in gold sequins, because when I look at them and try to understand what I am seeing, my eye starts twitching and my mind shuts down completely. Perhaps my mind simply cannot grasp the magnificence of the golden Uggs or why Jason thought that was a good idea.
But my mother seems to like the sparkles.
