If you compliment something I’m wearing, or my purse, or a piece of jewelry, I’m likely going to offer up an interesting fact about it. I’m just that person. I’ve come to embrace it. What kind of facts, you ask? Things like, “You can still get it at Target,” or “I got it on sale for $3!” or “My best friend gave it to me for my birthday.” I have no idea why I do this, I guess my brain likes to make associations. 99% of the time, I have no qualms with this little peccadillo. But the 1% drives me insane.
I have this fantastic skirt. It’s classy, hugs my curves in all the right places and flares out with a subdued, yet feminine ruffle at the knee. It’s dark gray with black specks and made of raw silk so you can dress it up or down. Best yet, it is comfortable! Really, the only flaw in its design is that it doesn’t have pockets. However, with all of its other attributes, I’m willing to let that slide. The thing is, I hardly ever wear it. Maybe once or twice a year, tops. I always see it hanging there, admire it for a moment and then move on to something else. Wanna know why? It is the 1% that drives me insane because I wore the damn thing to my mother’s funeral.
Any other interesting fact about that skirt gets trumped by the fact that I wore it to my mother’s funeral, so that’s the fact that pops into my head. It doesn’t make me sad or bring up the emotions from that day, it’s simply a factoid. You compliment my glasses, I tell you that I got them for free because Lenscrafters broke my other frames while trying to fix them. You compliment my cute brown loafers, I tell you that I got them for half off on Zulily. You compliment my gray skirt . . . you know how this ends. Now truth be told, nobody has ever complimented me on my cute brown loafers. Mostly because I don’t think anyone else thinks they’re cute. There’s no accounting for taste (you can decide whose in this scenario.)
So if I had worn the brown loafers to my mother’s funeral, I would have zero problems. However, the damn skirt is so cute that I inevitably get 2-3 compliments on it every time I wear it. Then I have to bite my tongue to keep from blurting out, “I wore it to my mom’s funeral.” Because let’s face it, that would be awkward. Nothing puts a damper on a conversation like playing the dead mother card. Especially when it’s a complete stranger in the bathroom! Nobody wants to hear where I wore the skirt, they just want to tell me that it is super cute.
So I bite my tongue and move on with my day. Then somebody else says something and I bite my tongue again. This goes on all day until I get home and just to relieve the tension that has built up, I tell my dogs that I wore the stupid skirt to my mom’s funeral and I’m never wearing it again because it’s exhausting! And they wag their tails, give me kisses and don’t care that I said something macabre, because they’re dogs. Which just proves that dogs are easier than people.
If you haven’t already guessed, I recently wore that skirt and have thus been traumatized once more by the experience. I would get rid of it instead of ranting here, but it’s just so damn cute! Life is hard.