Thursday? Is it Thursday? Oh YEAH!

It’s LFB DAY! Woot!

This week’s topic was easy (THANKSgoodness): Commentary on Fashion. However you want to do it, just tell us what you think.

The thing with fashion is, there’s a multi-billion dollar industry built around it. Its sole purpose? Telling us what to wear, how to look. What NOT to wear.

Fashion, to some people, is a dirty word. It means expensive clothes, atrociously priced accessories, a whole host of ways in which the fashionably challenged can get easily lost or led astray (leg warmers, anyone?) To some, the world of fashion is just another way in which we can screw up and spend lots of money. It’s learning that the “only” jeans you should wear are low-rise flares or the “only” shirts are cute little crop tops that expose your (theoretically) perfectly sculpted abs and perfect little belly button. You’re supposed to carry ridiculously priced bags, 75% of which are too miniscule to fit a tampon, let alone my makeup, jewelry, cigarettes, wallet, and other essentials for an evening out.

In case my favorite fashionista, Wardrobe Slave, is reading this and unspeakably horrified at my cluelessness in what I said above, let me state clearly: I don’t have much of a fashion sense. All I know regarding what’s in fashion is what’s in the stores at places like Macy’s or (gasp!) Target. It seems like all that’s available anymore is low rise jeans and tops that are too small for me to button up over my generous bosoms, or have screen printing across the chest that stretches and separates in a way that seems specifically calculated to emphasize my overlarge assets. Unfortunately, my abs are not something I really want to expose to the light of day, and as anyone who has ever seen a woman hitching at the waistband of her fashionably low jeans knows, anyone with a little extra weight around the middle should NOT be wearing low rise jeans. Take a look around the mall next time, and see how many poor, misguided souls are out there with low rise jeans adamantly showing off the rolls of fat (that really aren’t as bad if you’re not wearing jeans with a waist right around your hips) overflowing over the top. Barely covered, incidentally, by tops that are much too short to ever hide the expanses of flesh hanging out the top.

So really, the question becomes, is it a lack of fashion sense that makes these people look so sad and lost, or is it a lack of knowledge of what to WEAR on their bodies that causes it?

I’m not a beleiver in the idea that larger women (i.e. not a convenient size 10 or below) have to dress like fashion freaks because nothing else is available in their size. I think that we have a right to dress fashionably as well. So what is fashionable that larger women can wear? I don’t beleive that low rise jeans should be made in sizes higher than a 10. Seriously, ladies, there is nothing worse than seeing a woman hiking up her pants all the time because the low rise jeans slip down and expose her midsection. I think that there are some fashions that some people just can’t wear…and shouldn’t.

So what is fashionable for normal people? Sometimes, I swear, it’s like the fashion industry or whoever it is that creates clothing at the department stores, is determined that either big people should not wear any clothes at all, or that the clothes that fit will make them look like circus freaks left behind when the show moved on. I once found, when trying to find a pair of jeans in an otherwise “fashionable” store, a pair of teal green corduroys imprinted with black paisley. I mean, COME ON. Just because I’m bigger doesn’t mean like I want to look like some oversized tie.

And that’s not even discussing the price of the clothes that actually fit and look good at the same time. What is it about expensive clothing that makes women feel like they fit in, like they are someone important or special? Why does having a $300 pair of shoes make Carrie feel like she’s successful and fashionable? Why does it have to TAKE a $300 pair of shoes to be fashionable? Why can’t personality traits be fashionable? Why does it have to be clothes and accessories? Why does it have to be what we put onto our outsides than what we put into our insides? Why does it matter if I’m wearing some crazy color that the fashion gods have determined to be the “new black”? Will people really like me better? Will men suddenly think I’m the hottest thing to walk into the bar just because I’m wearing some kind of designer label?

I don’t know. I know that when I indulge in something that is totally expensive by some well known designer (and it’s even better if I can get it for some ridiculously low clearance price) I feel like a million bucks. Something about Calvin Klein jeans fit and feel better than my typical ones I pick up at Target. Something about a pair of boots by Steve Madden is so much more luxurious than something from Payless Shoes. I know some of it is the quality of the materials and workmanship. I know some is just knowing, “I’m wearing Calvin Klein jeans” and some is just knowing that I splurged on something expensive and something about it makes me feel good.

All those other questions? No idea.