10-Day Challenge: Day #2

As previously mentioned, it was my birthday at the weekend. And one of the presents I was given was a pair of gloves. This may not, at first, sound like a particularly exciting present. But, oh, these gloves. They are a work of art. They are gloriously, fabulously extravagant gloves. They are velvet, with a bold flower pattern on a dark green background. 

Gloves from heaven

 

These are the kind of gloves that I have spent most of my life marvelling at, but never being brave enough to wear. In retrospect, I have spent a disappointingly large portion of my life hiding myself in shapeless, formless, colourless clothes. Oversized, charcoal-grey, men's jumpers and jeans constituted a large portion of my wardrobe through my teens and early twenties. It is only in the last decade and a half* that I have begun to find the confidence to wear colours and patterns. Now, I am happy to wear a yellow pinafore dress with dinosaurs on, or a tweed cape with a magenta silk lining. I would not describe my dress sense as particularly flamboyant, nor eccentric (aside, perhaps, from the aforementioned cape). But I rarely now fall in love with an item of clothing but think to myself, "I could never get away with that." Yet that was very much the story of my younger years. Now, my taste and my confidence are much more closely aligned, so it is only finances or common-sense** that now come between falling in love with clothing and wearing it

So my positive thought for today is how much better life is now that I can just be me, now I can wear things that I love and not be afraid of judgement, now that I can smile to myself just at the thought of a beautiful pair of gloves.

* See also changes experienced between the ages of 30 and 40

** This is not entirely true. Common-sense was not in evidence when I bought a blue and gold brocade corset in the middle of a global pandemic. Because I have had so many opportunities for glamorous evening wear this year.