Down Under

Last week, an Australian lingerie company emailed me to suggest that I use my platform as a blogger for the Huffington Post to promote their website. They offered to compensate me for subtly selling their products in my posts, and invited me to contact them for further information.

Needless to say, I did not respond. I have journalistic integrity, for starters. But perhaps more interestingly, these people clearly have no idea what kind of underwear I wear. If they did, I seriously doubt they would be asking for my endorsement.

Now, why would an Australian lingerie company reach out to a woman who wears sweatpants most of the time and writes from a room over her garage? Good question, indeed. My mind puzzled through this conundrum as I got dressed for the day in my comfy cotton bikini briefs and a bra I picked up at a two-for-one sale at Kohl's.  Continue reading here.

Dressing for Success

“Where are you coming from?” My friend Amy asked as we chatted briefly in town. I was dripping sweat from head to toe. “Lemme guess? Spin?” She asked. I nodded, feeding more quarters into my parking meter. “I can’t do spin,” Amy said. “I don’t…”and here she tilted her head skyward, searching for the right words.

Let’s pause. For instructional purposes, I’m going to ask you to guess the end of her sentence. Remember, it began with “I don’t.” Was Amy’s predicate:
a) like sweating profusely while pop music pounds in my inner ear, or
b) enjoy riding a stationary bike to nowhere, or
c) have the right outfit.

If you guessed c, then this is the article for you.

Press play.

“Not true!” I said. “You don’t need an outfit. You just need leggings.” I inspected Amy’s legs, which were already clad in tight black lycra. “Like those! You’re good to go.”

And then I invited her to join me any time she wanted to try a class.

We waved goodbye. I watched her go, a thought bubble developing in the empty air between us.

Who was I kidding? Of course she needed an outfit.

Here’s why. A few years ago, I was struggling to complete my doctoral dissertation. It was a bitch. I had just received feedback on a round of revisions that I felt were satisfactory; my doctoral committee disagreed. I had to re-write about 100 pages of text and I didn’t know if I had the mental or physical endurance to do it. I didn’t even know if I cared anymore about finishing my degree. So I did what any self-respecting 38 year old woman would do in such a situation: I scream-cried to my mom on my cell phone about it after dropping off my children at school, with a narrative that went something like this: “I-can’t-won’t-do-this-anymore-hate-them-me-you-Brett-all-suck-getting-fat-want-to-give-up-so-mean!” I hung up on her mid-panic attack and drove around for a while.

Then I went to the gym.

I took a deep breath and entered a 9:30 stretch and strength class, grabbing some 2-pound weights. I selected a spot on the carpet that seemed like a good location based on my ability; just left of center from the middle of the square room. And then I caught a look at my reflection, and panicked all over again.

When my friend Sloan entered the class, I took one look at her and burst into fresh tears.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, her sharp blue eyes showing concern. She came and sat next to me.

I told her about the failed attempt to complete my dissertation. “And,” I added, gaining momentum, “everyone in this class is wearing LONG pants and I have on these wide, weird, CROPPED ones!”

“Oh,” she said softly, her consoling eyes gazing around the room. “That’s true.”

But then Sloan gave me some wise advice: It was a problem that was easily fixed. All I had to do was to buy a nice, new pair of long, lean yoga pants. I’d feel better the next time I came to class because I’d blend in. The dissertation? She was sorry, but her advice couldn’t really help me with that.

You may be rolling your eyes at me now, thinking that I’m only going skin deep to believe – and, further, to admit in the newspaper to believing – that what I wear to a stretch class or what my friend Amy (or anyone else for that matter) wears to a spin class (or any other venue, for that matter) matters.

But it does.

We all know that old adage to “dress for success,” which has certain connotations for the business world. In our careers, we have been told to dress more like the part we want to be (boss, leader, corporate somebody) instead of the part we really are (harried mom, student, corporate nobody). Put on a power suit and feel powerful, the advice goes. Well, I would like to suggest that the same is true for gym attire.

I am not what you’d call a big fan of exercise. I lack some pretty elemental hand-eye coordination, making the catching and throwing while running portions of sports implausible. Plus, I am in no way competitive. I could seriously care less if I win or lose on the field. In fact, I used to try my hardest to be picked last for teams in gym, and then wished with all my might to be positioned somewhere on the fringe of the game or deep in the outfield.

Not every sport has an outfield in which to hide. But, they do all have uniforms. Standard outfits, some basics for what to wear while playing (or pretending to play) said game. And so, for me to feel competent and comfortable while at spinning class or in yoga, I need to dress the part. Much like a secretary who hopes someday to have the corner office, I dress for the back row of spin class like I’m someday going to be front and center.

This requires a few pairs of basic (but cute!) leggings and tanks that I can mix and match and grab and go. Having a uniform like this makes my mornings stress-free and makes me feel athletic, even though I’m totally not. In my exercise clothes, I feel like people look at me and say, “Oh, she’s so fit! Look at Julie going off to spin class again.” What they don’t know is that, sometimes, I drive right from spin to my favorite bakery.

They may notice, however, that I do not wear the newest, latest, couture fashion tank, nor do I wear bright leggings or clothing studded with bling. This kind of adorable hipness I reserve for the true athletes. They’ve earned it, what with their triceps and biceps and sculpted shoulders, shoulders that I’m not sure I even have under all the layers of croissant. Part of me worries about over-dressing for the part, calling attention to my weaknesses (spinning really fast while standing) instead of my strengths (rocking out on a hill and singing along with the tunes). When I lack the skills, I’d rather be doing it in a basic (but cute!) uniform that doesn’t attract too much attention.

So, to answer your question honestly, Amy, yes. You require an outfit. Embrace it. Own it. Do it. It’s okay. I’ll help you pick it out, if you’d like. Then you’ll have the right gear for the occasion, and it will be one less thing to worry about. And then we can hit the gym together in style.

Today I can do four push-ups. Tomorrow, after I put on my Lululemon yoga pants, I can most certainly imagine myself doing five.

The Girl Who Played with Fire

“I don’t know how this could have happened,” I sighed.

“Strange,” my husband, Brett, agreed.

“A mystery.”

We were holding between us my relatively new, not inexpensive Bottega Veneta pocketbook. A large, neat gash stared back at us. The leather across the handle had apparently ripped, or perhaps been cut. For the life of me, I couldn’t figure out what had caused this. Had I been walking near scissors? Did I recall being yanked by my pocketbook down the streets of town?

I had only worn it a few times, and already, it would need to be repaired. The bag was bumming me out.

“This is why you shouldn’t buy ridiculous pocketbooks,” Brett said, blaming me for the damage while simultaneously reminding me that I spend too much money on frivolous items, thereby scoring two points for the Husbands of Scarsdale.

I may have given him the finger.

This move only gives us Wives a bonus point if we make it to overtime.

I brought the bag to Bottega and was told that repairs would cost $65 and take about 6 weeks to complete. I returned from my day in the city even deeper in bummage and with some interesting news for Brett. “The repair department at Bottega says that it looks like my pocketbook was burned.”

“Burned?” He asked.

“That’s what I just said.”

We eventually dropped it, moving on to other exciting topics like who was driving to Little League and whether or not the mozzarella had spoiled. (You smell it/I’m not smelling it/let’s have the kids smell it/just toss it.)

At some point during the evening viewing of CNN, Brett snapped his fingers at me. “I’ve got it!”

“What?”

“The pocketbook. You burned it.”

“I did, huh?”

“Yes!” He said, triumphant.

“Okay, Sherlock, let’s hear it.”

Brett explained his theory. “It happened during your high school reunion.”

I immediately rolled my eyes. Since the event, Brett liked to blame anything and everything on my high school reunion. I’m spending too much time on Facebook – because of the reunion. I talk hypothetically about wanting Botox and Restyalne (and a boob job and a tummy tuck and some lipo) – blame it on the reunion. So, naturally, my Italian woven leather premium designer handbag is burned, and who’s to blame? The Edgemont High School Class of 1988.

“Seriously!” He said.

“How?”

“From your cigarette.”

Well. He may have had a point there.

In fact, he may have scored two points for the Husbands by simultaneously solving the mystery while making me feel bad for smoking.

It was almost a case closed moment.

Almost.

But. Just as Brett was about to gloat big time, I stood up and grabbed another pocketbook from the front hall. Throwing it over my right arm, I reconstructed the moment.

“Okay, let’s just say, for argument’s sake, that I was smoking a cigarette that night.”

“And by ‘a’ do you mean four?”

“And that, since I’m right-handed, my bag was perched over my right shoulder and my cigarette was in my right hand. Agreed?”

“Agreed, council.” Brett nodded.

“So, in that case, it is virtually impossible for me to burn my own pocketbook with my own cigarette because I’d have to be going like this –“ I demonstrated the way one would have to stand with elbow bent up over her own shoulder – “and I would never stand like that! It’s unnatural, I tell you, unnatural!”

Brett’s silence proved me right.

He scratched his head and reconsidered. “It was someone smoking near you then, gesturing with a cigarette in hand.”

“Fine,” I conceded. “We can blame Todd Ross, if you’d like.”

“Your first kiss?”

“Yes.”

“The guy who crashed his dad’s Porsche into a stone pillar outside the high school?”

“Yes.”

“Good. He did it.”

Case closed.

Almost.

Months went by and my pocketbook was returned to me. The saleswoman at Bottega apologized; the leather repair guru, who has been in the business for 40 plus years, had never seen anything like this and had only been able to do So Much to help.

Damn you, Todd Ross, I chanted.

Now my authentic bag, with a huge patch of stiff leather on the handle, looked like a fake. I went home and hung it on a doorknob in my kitchen, studying it in the light, wondering if I’d ever feel the same way about it again.

A few weeks later, my kids and I came home from school and smelled something funny in the kitchen and office. Like gas, like oil, like fire.

It was a familiar odor, one that had plagued me about a year before, on another warm day like this one. Back then, I had immediately evacuated the house and called the fire department.

Two trucks had showed up while my kids jumped up and down in a combination of fear and excitement that can only come about when you are 8 and 5 and your house probably won’t blow up, although maybe it will.

The firemen had been very patient and thorough, listening to me describe the smells and symptoms that they could not detect at all with either their noses or their gadgets.

“Right here,” I kept saying, “between the kitchen and the office door. There is an oily smell trapped right here.”

“Sorry, ma’am,” they kept saying, “your house is just fine.”

Not that they were sorry that my house was fine. You know what I mean.

So, this time, with the same stench filling my nostrils, I wasn’t going to panic. I took the kids to their afternoon activities and decided that, should the smell still be there when we returned, I’d call the fire department immediately.

When we returned, the smell was gone.

That night, I debriefed with Brett over dinner in the kitchen.

“The smell was right here?” He asked, moving towards the door to the office.

“Yes.” I nodded. “And it’s the same smell that had me calling the fire department last summer.”

“Right here, where your pocketbook is hanging, you mean?” He asked. “In the heat of the day?”

“Yes, right where my pocketbook ---“ I said.

Dear reader, do I need to finish this sentence? Do I need to tell you that, in order to be fashionable, we had installed clear glass doorknobs throughout the house, and that, when light hits those doorknobs it will create a burning lens that will concentrate the sun’s rays onto any flammable object in it’s path – let’s just say a fine, Italian leather pocketbook strap – thus resulting in the conflagration of that object, like a leaf under a magnifying glass?

In other words, my Bottega was on fire.

Again.

Well, it wasn’t anymore.

Brett lifted the pocketbook and we inspected it together. Sure enough, there was a new tear, in the same exact spot as the old one, just like a burn mark one might get from a cigarette, only much bigger.

“I’m not sure how long this will take to fix, or how much repairs will cost,” the young saleswoman at the counter of the Bottega store said.

“That’s okay, I do.” I said. “You want to hear a funny story? Twice?”

I hope this tale brings some sort of meaning to your life, as it did mine. Should you be on the verge of buying an expensive accessory, you may stop and reconsider. Should your husband be on the verge of blaming you for something you did at your high school reunion, he may stop and reconsider. And last, but certainly not least, please stop and reconsider my lovely Bottega the next time you see me in town. It is a damaged old bag, carrying stories of pain and redemption, but really, aren’t we all?

Weather or Not

I come from a long line of Women Who Dress. No matter how insignificant the occasion, we make sure we have just the right thing to wear for it.

Take my grandmother, for example, who never learned how to swim. But did that stop her from getting all dolled up in a bathing suit costume for 1920’s Coney Island? I should say not.

“I wore black stockings, rubber dress shoes, and a bathing suit that hit my knees,” My grandmother explained on the phone to me one night.

“Sounds hot,” I replied.

She laughed, reminiscing. “Yes, well, I was quite a beauty back in the day.”

“No, Nanny, I mean literally. Like h-o-t hot. On the beach in summer, in stockings and rubber shoes!”

“Did I mention that the bow on the bathing suit had to match the bow on one’s head?”

“Now that’s cool,” I added, confusing her completely. In the 1920’s and 30’s, my grandmother was absolutely “in” on the beach, even if she never actually went swimming.

Jump ahead to New York City, circa 1988. My parents moved in to the city from Scarsdale as I headed off to college. My mom had to adjust a little bit to urban life after years in suburbia. Walking the dog was a relatively new concept, for example. In Westchester, my mom could just open the back door and let Ellie out in the backyard. But in Manhattan, my mom had to take her out for actual walks.

Which begged the question, What to wear when walking the dog?

I mean, my mom was out in public. On the Upper East Side. In broad daylight. For a good ten minutes, a few times a day, in all seasons, all types of weather. What was a woman who dressed with shoulder pads supposed to do?

Walk the Dog Outfits were required.

Many of them.

Every time my mom and I would shop, she’d be looking for more appropriate clothing for this specific purpose. The barn jacket that wasn’t too long or too short? Perfect for walking the dog. The new Hermes scarf? Throw it on over any sweater and you can walk the dog in it! Ballet flats that looked like her Chanel ones but weren’t the real deal? Walk the dog in quilted fabulousness!

Now you will understand me. You will understand why, when I heard that torrential rains were forecasted a few weeks back, I did not think, oh, maybe I better stay home and hope that a tree doesn’t fall on my house. No, my first thought was, it’s a perfect time to get those Hunter rain boots I’ve been stalking.

After all, one must be prepared, no matter the occasion. And this occasion was calling for some really bad weather. Like the Katz-Goldberg woman I was, I hoped to weather the storm in style.

So you don’t think me callous or shallow, my shopping excursion took place on the Thursday before the now-infamous Saturday hurricane/Nor’easter. I had no way of knowing just how devastating this storm would be, or how seriously it would affect the Village and its inhabitants.

I merely did what any fashionista would. I got all excited deciding what color rain boots to get.

Of course I fell in love with the one color that was out of stock. They were coming in Monday or Tuesday, at the very the latest, I was informed by the saleswoman. Our eyes met. “But you probably want them before that,” she acknowledged. “Like for this weekend’s rain.”

“Yeah, that was kind of the plan,” I agreed, picturing myself dancing through puddles on the streets of Scarsdale Village, a jaunty umbrella in hand, humming “Singing in the Rain.”

I sighed and left the store, my name on a waiting list, trying not to be too disappointed. The brown Hunter rain boots were not meant to be, not yet at least. I would have to weather this storm in my Uggs.

Of course, the last thing I was thinking about was footwear, when, 48 hours later, I found myself driving across the George Washington Bridge, returning from a bar mitzvah in New Jersey with 50 mile an hour winds whipping my car from side to side.

I had precious cargo with me, in the form of my son, Andrew, in the back, and my former bathing beauty of a 97-year-old grandmother in the passenger seat next to me.

We now all know what happened that night, as the rain and wind wreaked havoc on our local area. My family was very lucky, as we never lost power, and no trees fell on our house, property or street.

Without plans for my educationally-deprived children on the Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday after the storm, we ended up frequenting the diner, strolling the mall, and finding other, similar places to hang out and pass the time lest we go completely mad.

But with so many tress down and traffic lights out of commission, it was hard to reach the ice cream place. As I circumnavigated Edgewood and parts of Heathcote, I felt like Magellan, on the verge of charting a course westward to find the Spice Islands. Only my ship of sailors and I were bound for the land of chocolate covered gummy bears.

Land ho, we eventually made it! And what did we find when we arrived? The Last Licks Refugees.

There is really no other term to describe the homeless, powerless mothers and their sugar-high kids, wandering the Golden Horseshoe, left to their own devices without a school schedule to keep them sane.

Here were moms forced by circumstance into living with their very own mothers-in-law, with no discernable end date in sight. From wherever they were temporarily housed, be it the remote corners of New Rochelle to a luckier block of Scarsdale proper, it was Last Licks to which they came and congregated each day, telling tales and licking cones of fat free soft serve. Tales of frustration and spoiled food, of sleeping on couches, raising their voices at the people at village hall, begging, please, get that 1000 pound tree off my street. I cannot live with my in-laws another moment. My children must attend school. We love school!

My heart went out to these powerless masses, to the mothers and fathers who felt so adrift without their home base.
My cell phone rang as my kids and I were finishing off a pound and a half of candy while learning card tricks from Magic Al.
The shoe store had my boots!

We walked the few paces from Last Licks to retrieve them. My post-storm reverie had me wearing the new purchase while shin-deep in water in a neighbor’s basement, helping to bail them out. Forget singing in the rain!

But, alas, upon inspection, the Hunters were damaged. “We expect the re-order to come in about three weeks,” I was told. “We’ll call you when they arrive.”

I smiled and left the store, my name on another waiting list, not at all disappointed on this sunny day. After all, there would be other storms, other chances for rain. No one wants bad weather, but we know eventually it will come.

And next time, when it does, my boots and I will be ready.

Purple Haze

I’m on the verge of putting a bumper sticker on my car that says “slap me: I’m obsessed with purple.” Purple shoes, purple sweaters, purple leather gloves with cashmere lining. I’ve got it all. I love it all! I recently had to call a friend while I was standing in Lord & Taylor and demand an intervention on a purple pocketbook that was dangling on my arm. It was begging me to take it home.

“No more purple!!!” Kate demanded.

“But...but...” I stammered, turning this way and that in front of the mirror, cell phone pressed to my ear.

“If you are thinking that this bag will look great with your new purple flats, you are seriously misguided. That would be a fashion disaster.”

I sort of heard her through the purple haze in my brain. Then my mom beeped in. “Hold on, Kate.” I switched over and immediately started talking. “Mom, I know I just called you before and didn’t leave a message. I’m having a purple problem, but Kate’s on it.”

“Just say no!” I heard her say as I hung up and switched back to an awaiting Kate, thinking that everyone sounded a bit too drug-era Nancy Reagan for me. Because I was thinking just say yes.

What is it with trends? How do I fall into every trap every season? My friend Andie thinks it’s because of the trend reports we receive from magazines and department stores, telling us what’s on this year’s “hot list” and “must haves.” It’s sad but true. I read those things and, suddenly, I find myself looking for accessories with studded hardware, or tops with cutouts at the shoulders (which, by the way look incredibly ridiculous on me). It’s hot! It’s a must-have, so I must have it…right?
Grey nail polish? Awesome. Just walk me to the counter and give them my credit card. I’m like a fashion lemming.

When I go shopping, I try really hard to drown out the sound of the little voice telling me what’s hot, cool and new. And I know that, as I get older, most of these trends are not meant for me, at least not in their purest and hippest form. I’m fine with a watered-down, suburban mom version of leggings, for example. I have them, but I wear them with ballet flats and a long sweater instead of with heels, a micro-mini skirt, and a tank top that looks like it has been mauled by a rabid cat.

Just, you know, for example.

By telling you about my recent color addiction, I like to think that I’m in the first steps of recovery. The picture accompanying this proves that I’m not exaggerating. Unfortunately.

What’s next? I’m thinking rose gold jewelry. It’s so pretty. And it looks great with purple.