affirmations.

It is positively gorgeous weather. 

The kind of weather that fuels me.

Where sunbeams radiate from the top of my head 

and the tips of my toes. 

SO!

Enough hibernating.

I have Birkenstocks that need me.

(Also I want to apologize to all in attendance for my sidewalk humming but I watched "The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel" for the third time this week and damn, what a snappy soundtrack.)
Not to mention, we live in a world with Annamarie Tendler-Mulaney in it.

PRAISES BE
to a season that gives us a full series order for "Maisel" and
wonderful, funny, inspirational people and

sumptuous, sumptuous weather such as this!!!!

that time everyone bought the same millennial pink prom dress.

T O D A Y L E T ' S T A L K D E S I G N . . .

When I was in high school (seven years ago, which is a crazy, stupid, and depressing amount of sands in my hourglass) someone my senior created a revolutionary Facebook group: “Don’t Steal My Dress, BITCH! Prom 2010.”

The concept was simple; post a screenshot of your dress in this marvelous little group before any other hoe even deigned to try it on. Bonus points if the pic was of you wearing the dress in a Bloomingdale’s fitting room with a saucy caption like: “Hand’s off ladies! This one is MINE!”

Looking back this practice seems deranged, or at the very least the epitome of a first world problem. So what, two girls show up in the same dress? The only real problem to matriculate would be if their dates confused them and if THAT were the case then we have bigger dragons to slay, ladies.

Yet, isn’t using a private Facebook group to organize the masses in this way… a little bit brilliant? Prom was the Academy Awards of my high school years. Most of my friends played soccer or sang in musicals. Do you know what I did? I read YA romance novels and spent hours experimenting with liquid eyeliner. I was ALL GIRL and holy heck, prom fed my soul in unspeakable ways.

I didn’t concern myself with finding a date (flew solo both years!) because I was more consumed with finding my exceptional, amazing, one-of-a-kind, Fug Girls-approved dress. And if some biddie dared to show up in my coral, shimmering sheath? THROW HER TO THE WOLVES!

You bet I lavished that Facebook group with attention and praise. Yadda, yadda, sisterhood, but I’m telling you that at the end of the day no girl wants to share her signature look.

Which is why my visit to HelloGiggles today began with a sharp intake of breath.

Because HelloGiggles LOOKS DIFFERENT*

And by DIFFERENT I mean EXACTLY THE SAME as every other millennial woman-skewed site.

See what I mean?

Like, yowza.

One more...

Now guys, blush pink is the hue of my natural aura, but even I’m starting to tire of millennial pink’s bug-eyed grasp of consumer-friendly aesthetics these days. These sites are near identical.** I’m not one to question the bottom line (This is a lie. I very much question the bottom line on  p l e n t y   o f   t h i n g s) but I must ask myself: even if Refinery29 is leading the wave of cool-girl digital channels, is it necessary to copy their design to achieve similar results?

I know, I know. Stealing has always been the way of the working world. “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery,” blah blehh. I get that many of these designers probably didn’t have a choice when creating the sites. They probably got a list of demands from their new, fuddy step-parent and acted accordingly. No one wants to lose their job because, what, they had a moral obligation to resist the evils of color hex #fdb2cb? Lol no.

But speaking as most of these sites’ prime TV-consuming, makeup loving, 100% girly girl female demographic, I want something new. Something unique. I don’t like sharing. Prom dresses or otherwise. As the age old wisdom goes, “Comparison STEALING is the thief of joy!” So let’s get some redesigns in place that make me feel something other than minimalism-induced insanity.  

*The site was apparently redesigned in September 2016, but helloooooo, we were all a-tizzy with more pressing news at the time.
**Disclaimer: I read and love all of these sites. Keep churning out quality content, ladies!

on enthusiasm.

Today I got a shocking rejection letter. Unsurprising, as it joins a family of at least thirty others (I’m not counting the hundreds of unanswered emails and inquiries).

Rather, the “shocking” part of this letter was that I cried when I received it. Big, heavy, ugly sobs. I’ve developed thick skin since moving to New York last fall, so rejection is par for the course these days. But for some reason this rejection stung, like taking hydrogen peroxide to both retinas. I was shaken by my response...

The position in question was a summer internship. I thought I’d be a shoo-in. With more than a year of professional working experience, plus four unpaid internships prior, I’d maintained that I could swing an entry level position in the city. When that belief became less apparent, I applied to summer internships—typically reserved for undergraduates.

Recruiters encouraged the application process and said that my lack of agency experience was best combatted with an internship. They asked me to keep in touch. Yesterday I emailed a quick, bright note alerting one such recruiter that I’d applied. She and I chatted on the phone twice this winter, what I perceived as chummy, yet professional interactions. In less than 24 hours my application was denied. No reply.

I’m not naive to think that the world owes me a job simply for showing up. Yet I am starting to question if there’s something so repulsive about my personality that recruiters immediately dismiss me. I’ve been rejected for dozens of entry-level positions. I know New York is competitive, but am I missing a personal red flag? Then, the other night at dinner, one of my friends observed something interesting…

today i want to be a gucci girl.

Today Refinery29 dedicated a WHOLE POST to Sienna Miller's Spring 2017 Gucci dress. 

I cannot blame them in the slightest. 

Because today

and every day before and after

I    w a n t    t o    b e    a    G u c c i    g i r l .

Let's reminisce about the glory that was, is, and shall be Spring 2017 as I hole up with 

my space heater, down blanket, and jar of Vitamin D supplements, dig? 

i'm just curious...

I deactivated my Instagram account last week. I deleted the app from my phone back in August, but something stirred in me after New Year's, prompting a commitment to really distance myself from the 'gram.

Maybe I deactivated because I'm waist-deep in my own perceived failures (i.e. quitting my job and moving to New York without much to show for it four months later). Or maybe because I subconsciously wanted to be as far removed from other people's successes as possible. Doesn't that sound awful? This "social media comparison as the thief of joy" phenomenon has been studied and reported to death, so my feelings aren't unprecedented. But what's interesting to me is that with all this research and insight, social media continues thrive despite thousands of private and public "fasts."

When I told one of my friends about my Instagram inactivity she confided that she deleted Snapchat from her phone days earlier. Both the pressure to keep up with new dating norms (boys "snap" now instead of text... I'm sorry, what?) and her time-consuming exploration of Snapchannels inspired the deletion. She felt she was wasting energy on an app that offered little fulfillment in return.

Another friend feels the same way about Facebook. She hasn't deleted her account, but rarely visits the site. Still another friend vowed (in the form of a New Year's resolution) that she would kibosh her late-night Instagram scrolling. She said she's losing important sleeping hours while passively scrolling pre-snooze... simply out of habit.

I don't experience the same disquietude with Snapchat. There's less precision, less pretentious "curation" on the time-sensitive app. Plus I choose who's story I watch and who I interact with. And there's little quantitative validation on Snapchat, unlike the "likes" and "comments" on Insta. But I understand the frustration. Witnessing every single friend and acquaintance's happiest moments is unnatural. Never in history have we been privy to so many highs and virtually no lows. No wonder society's psyche is being reshaped.

So my question is this: how do we combat this trend? Is there a way to exist in a social media-hungry world without the accompanying despondency? And don't suggest that Instagram can be reframed as a platform for "creativity" or "inspiration." In my mind--and after many futile attempts, history dictates--it cannot. Nor can its effects be mitigated by finding my own sense of peace with my circumstances. The already present strain to do so is magnified when I'm confronted with daily engagement announcements and work promotions.

Obviously for now my best course of action is to veer away from Instagram. But tell me, how do your personal experiences inform the future of social media?  
 

twenty seventeen.

Hey, hi, hello. 

Let me start by saying how much I love Blogger. 

I tried transitioning the blog to Wordpress. 

I tried transitioning the blog to Squarespace.

I liked using both. I will continue to use both...

But there's something about 

this hokey website 

that no one loves 

that feels very, very sincere to me.
Like Charlie Brown's Christmas tree.

ANYWAY. Enough about how much I dig antiquated Blogger. 

It's  T W E N T Y   S E V E N T E E N !

Let me tell you about life lately...

spinning.

I moved to New York exactly three weeks ago. Obviously it's the craziest, most impulsive thing I've ever done (minus that quick stint at Chapel Hill). I wake up every morning beaming with optimism and a heart warmed by the belief that I'm on the cusp of something brilliant, that everything will fall into place like puzzle pieces fitting together. Today is the first day, though, that I woke up and didn't feel that exhilaration. Maybe it's because the first email of the day I sent was incorrectly addressed in its salutation. (Foolish and a reason a recruiter should trash my resume immediately.) Maybe it's because my first real, longterm boyfriend has moved on two months after our breakup and I still wail like dying animal listening to this on repeat. Maybe because this is all very, very scary and I feel ill equipped to deal with this sudden, sharp, and unexpected turn my life has taken.

My mom likes to chant, "Greater risk, greater reward" during exceptionally anxious moments. My dad believes that "You have to climb thorny branches to get to the best fruit." What if those idioms don't work in my favor? I know all it takes is one "yes" but right now I'm facing a lot of "no's"... actually, I don't even get the benefit of rejection. I just get silence. I think that's worse.