Thursday, December 09, 2004

The peanut butter girls

I spent an hour or so in the coffee shop tonight reading Bloomability for the teen book club I lead and couldn't help but eavesdrop a bit on the two women speaking in overly cultured tones next to me. I could see a flash of camel and sky-blue coats and tall pointy black boots (what is the point, really, if everyone is wearing tall pointy black boots? Why bother?) But it was their discussion that was truly banal. They spent the twenty minutes going over what one would wear on her upcoming trip to meet her boyfriend's family in Connecticut. The Gucci camel sweater there, the H&M pinstriped blazer here, the oversize Prada purse for the plane. Perhaps if one cares this much about clothing this kind of commitment to planning is required. As they left I was surprised to see that they looked surprisingly normal - one a bit chunky, the other a bit plain. What kind of employment did they have that possibly supported their spending habits? Unusual, but they didn't seem that they were putting on airs and bragging about their couture, what to wear seemed like a conversation that they had every day. By carefully mapping out the perfect outfit for each day and activity of the trip, she assuages her nervousness and feelings of inadequacy.

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