small dilemma
Aug. 10th, 2007 13:36![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
piranhasparked by a discussion of "modest swimwear" in another journal i've been pondering how i dress and why.
these days i dress for a maximum of comfort. loose-fitting pants and baggy tshirts are everyday wear. i swim in a tshirt and shorts -- i'm gonna get a microfibre tshirt because cotton is annoying when wet out of the water. shorts because they (microfibre as well) dry fast. i don't change at the place where i'm swimming -- i hop in the truck, drive 10 min to the river or the ocean, swim, hop back in the truck and drive home. this is about as good as it comes while still living on land. i really like the floaty feeling of the tshirt when swimming, it's sensually more pleasurable than swimming naked. and i like an extra layer between my skin and the elements, especially the rocky elements. :) i like whole bodysuits if made of a nice material, but spandex feels too constricting these days (i used to wear those every day).
i would swim naked sometimes if i didn't mind being stared at. however, i do mind, and none of the places i go to are entirely private. i'm looking forward to the boat for this reason too -- privacy will be much easier to come by.
i don't care about fashion. i don't care about what people think is "appropriate" for my body type -- it's none of anybody's business what another person does with their body. i don't look at other people and think "you should NOT be wearing that, you're too old, too young, too fat for it". for all i care i'd be happy if it were legal to walk around stark naked. i wouldn't do it, but more power to others if they want to. less prudishness, less judgment would be nice.
the feeling of not wanting to be stared at isn't about being ashamed of my body, i think. i am not 100% certain because i can't clearly separate out all the many things that have affected my attitude. i don't like my body overall, i even dislike it vehemently at times (it's human, and it's of the wrong sex to boot), but i am not ashamed of it. and since i am stuck with it, i make the best of it by dressing it in what feels good.
but some of what feels good gets too much attention. i mentioned the spandex bodysuits i used to wear -- bright colours, with a large shirt over them that would reach to mid-thigh or lower. i wasn't slim then, mind, and i got stared at regularly, and they weren't stares of admiration. i was in a quietly rebellious phase then and just ignored them pointedly, *heh*. which was good for me -- eventually i no longer cared at all whether anybody stared judgmentally.
but now i mostly just want to fly under the radar. i don't want people to look at me, i don't want to interact with random strangers at all, and even ignoring is an action that takes some energy (not much, but i also have so little that i am jealous of every bit that goes where it doesn't do anything neat). out here i do alright. but i noticed last year in montréal how much more people were staring at me, and not in admiration -- apparently a middle-aged, fat person in bike shorts and a big shirt is something to be critical of there. and it bugged me. i'd probably get used to it after a while, but the difference from how i mostly escape notice here was marked.
what i really want to wear these days is something a djellaba or yukata, or the sort of thing kendo martial artists wear -- hakama and keikogi. i love the way those look and feel. but alas if one dresses weird, one gets even more stares. dammit.
these days i dress for a maximum of comfort. loose-fitting pants and baggy tshirts are everyday wear. i swim in a tshirt and shorts -- i'm gonna get a microfibre tshirt because cotton is annoying when wet out of the water. shorts because they (microfibre as well) dry fast. i don't change at the place where i'm swimming -- i hop in the truck, drive 10 min to the river or the ocean, swim, hop back in the truck and drive home. this is about as good as it comes while still living on land. i really like the floaty feeling of the tshirt when swimming, it's sensually more pleasurable than swimming naked. and i like an extra layer between my skin and the elements, especially the rocky elements. :) i like whole bodysuits if made of a nice material, but spandex feels too constricting these days (i used to wear those every day).
i would swim naked sometimes if i didn't mind being stared at. however, i do mind, and none of the places i go to are entirely private. i'm looking forward to the boat for this reason too -- privacy will be much easier to come by.
i don't care about fashion. i don't care about what people think is "appropriate" for my body type -- it's none of anybody's business what another person does with their body. i don't look at other people and think "you should NOT be wearing that, you're too old, too young, too fat for it". for all i care i'd be happy if it were legal to walk around stark naked. i wouldn't do it, but more power to others if they want to. less prudishness, less judgment would be nice.
the feeling of not wanting to be stared at isn't about being ashamed of my body, i think. i am not 100% certain because i can't clearly separate out all the many things that have affected my attitude. i don't like my body overall, i even dislike it vehemently at times (it's human, and it's of the wrong sex to boot), but i am not ashamed of it. and since i am stuck with it, i make the best of it by dressing it in what feels good.
but some of what feels good gets too much attention. i mentioned the spandex bodysuits i used to wear -- bright colours, with a large shirt over them that would reach to mid-thigh or lower. i wasn't slim then, mind, and i got stared at regularly, and they weren't stares of admiration. i was in a quietly rebellious phase then and just ignored them pointedly, *heh*. which was good for me -- eventually i no longer cared at all whether anybody stared judgmentally.
but now i mostly just want to fly under the radar. i don't want people to look at me, i don't want to interact with random strangers at all, and even ignoring is an action that takes some energy (not much, but i also have so little that i am jealous of every bit that goes where it doesn't do anything neat). out here i do alright. but i noticed last year in montréal how much more people were staring at me, and not in admiration -- apparently a middle-aged, fat person in bike shorts and a big shirt is something to be critical of there. and it bugged me. i'd probably get used to it after a while, but the difference from how i mostly escape notice here was marked.
what i really want to wear these days is something a djellaba or yukata, or the sort of thing kendo martial artists wear -- hakama and keikogi. i love the way those look and feel. but alas if one dresses weird, one gets even more stares. dammit.
no subject
on 2007-08-11 11:33 (UTC)As a middle-aged woman, I feel mostly invisible in NYC, no matter what I'm wearing. People dress in so many different ways here that clothing usually doesn't elicit stares.
no subject
on 2007-08-11 12:19 (UTC)I'm decidedly not surprised. Montreal is the place in the world I've been to where I felt like everyone was on constant display and inspection everywhere. Five year olds were dressed to the nines. Everyone's hair was perfect, shoes spotless, stockings flawless. It was awe-inspiring and intimidating and I felt like a country bumpkin the whole time.
Note that I never feel quite this way in NYC where I've been much more often and where there are many grungy / weird folks and it's ok to not be fabulous all day every day.
montreal vs NYC
on 2007-08-11 18:50 (UTC)but because i was looking around a lot (hey, new city -- exciting!), and watching people myself out of the corner of my eye, i quickly realized montréal is different from other cities in canada, and different from NYC as well, in that people overall seem to care more about how they look, and that they are well-groomed and well-dressed (though not necessarily trendy) -- i'd guess it's the francophone influence; it has a more similar feel to some french cities than to any other large north american city i've been to. you can be frumpy-yet-normal and that'll be mostly overlooked, but dress a little weird (and not fashionably so) and you stand out negatively. different-yet-fashionable gets admired, and even out loud; i heard comments a couple of times.
i never felt people were staring at me in NYC -- in NYC pretty much anything goes. and while there are pockets which are very fashionable, and groups of people who dress to the nines, there is a much wider range, and overall people give the impression that they've seen everything weird already, and that nothing can faze them. like amsterdam. :) i blend right in; the range is large enough that i look normal there.
Re: montreal vs NYC
on 2007-08-14 16:01 (UTC)clearly this post made me think in stream of consciousness--no real conclusions, just a bunch of reactions.