>

Thursday, April 07, 2011

Haute Couture

The thing I spend the most time worrying about for work is not appointments, or schedules, or deadlines, or budgets. Heck, I don't even deal with budgets anymore. The thing I worry about most for work is What to Wear.

At the depths of the depression, the thought of What to Wear and the effort it was going to take to get it clean was often overwhelming to me and could send me into a tailspin. There were even a couple of days I called in to work because I just couldn't deal with it.

Things are better now, but I still spend quite a bit of time figuring out what will look best, feel best, coordinate, and most importantly, be clean. Or at least look and smell clean-ish. I've finally made a habit of finding and laying out my clothing the night before (and, for the most part, having my children do the same). It has made our mornings significantly better.

Still, the first thing I do when coming home is to peel off all of that work wear--all that planning and ironing and coordinating and accessorizing. I go from patent leather and pinstripes, ruffled sweaters and coordinating camisoles, jangling jewelry and coiffed hair, to paint-stained comfy pants, holey shirts, and a ponytail in less than a minute flat.

Deconstructing the facade. I look forward to it every day.

2 comments:

Angela said...

A big draw for the job here in FL is the work attire. It's a factory, and wearing nice clothes is discouraged, so I'm very comfortable most days. However, as someone who intends to move up the ladder here, I'm also trying to walk that line between The Snotty Dresser and The Person Who Thinks She's a Manager. It's so complicated. Men don't have to deal with this on nearly this level. It's either suit and tie or not suit and tie.

But, as for the depression making this seem overwhelming, I completely understand. Really, really, really.

~Melissa M.~ said...

During my...er, a friend's "working in an office" years, said friend may or may not have kept a small, dry-erase calendar in her closet and wrote down each day what she wore in order to not repeat an outfit within a two week time-frame.