Summer Fashion...Friend or Foe for the Over 40's?
8 June 2008
Carrie and the girls may have moved to New York in search of labels and love (unsure of what to do with them at times) but at the ages of somewhere between 40 and 50, the girls have each truly found their own sense of style. Yes, in TV land it all helps to create character and add dimension to an otherwise 2 dimensional art form. Some may argue that it is still 2 dimensional, plot included but in this case, I say categorically, 'No!'.
It is one of the privileges we women over 40 have and it's one that I don't think many of us use to our advantage. Why we don't is very baffling for me. So now I'm on a quest to find out as much about this phenomenon as I can and help to turn it around.
It's the privilege of just being ourselves.
Maybe it's so hard because we have lost the understanding of who we are. Maybe after years of attending to the needs of others, we can't identify ours and how to meet them.
Maybe, our self esteem has taken such a battering that we've lost every crumb of confidence and don't have the courage to rebuild and roar.
Maybe...and saddest of all...we've never known who we really are and now, after all this time and out of exhaustion and frustration, we just can't be bothered.
Understand all of this I do. Accept it...I don't!
I absolutely know why it happens, having been to some of those less than glamorous places myself and belonged to underground cultures that you only obtain membership to once you've had horrible stuff happen to you.
But that's just it. Stuff happens and when it does...you are the victim. But then you get over it and move on - or do you? I wonder if it's rather like those ugly bugs you get in your gut. You get rid of it, only to find that it comes back again because some part of it lingers inside you...it never really ever goes. Horrid thought...'eeeew!' to quote my 3 year old.
Here is THE classic victim comment I hear almost weekly.
The last thing I want to look like is 'mutton dressed as lamb'... I'm too old to wear that. It's for those young girls and is not appropriate for someone my age.
What the heck does that mean?!!
Last time I checked, there wasn't a rule book handed out on age appropriate dressing. Are we going to be incarcerated for wearing something from Dotti when we are 50!
You may find that you are actually cheered, not jeered because, heaven forbid, you actually look great!
Those that jeer usually do so because it's a way for them to somehow make themselves feel good, usually at the expense of others...others they so desperately and in some way admire, for doing what they wished they had the ability and courage to do.
So I say, 'power to the mutton dressed as lamb girls'. At least they care enough about themselves to have a go - even if they don't do themselves a favour at times. Failure is not a weakness.
It is about balance, as all things in life are.
Thoughtlessly flabbing about, letting certain parts of our less than flattering anatomy hang out, is tragic. But more often than not, this fear of pressing the 'mutton button' is all too often used as an excuse by women who just don't have the confidence to break out of their fashion 'uniform', to care enough about themselves to even try.
So fashion...friend or foe? At the risk of sounding like an economist, it's both.
Fashion is basically a tool, just like botox, push up bras and control briefs. Tools that if used appropriately, can perform wonders and help us to look great and ultimately, feel great about ourselves. I defy any woman (particularly over 40) to say she wouldn't feel warm all over having caught the eye of a younger man, obviously taken aback by how fab she looked.
But it even goes beyond looking good. It's about self expression. How you look tells the world how you feel about yourself and who you really think you are. Confident, fun, happy (and heaven forbid...sexy!)...bored, flat, unimportant, insignificant.
Carrie, Miranda, Charlotte and Samantha are women of style who use fashion in their arsenal very well, to proudly and courageously let the world know who they are. True women of style...their own.
What is so beautifully poetic, is that they do it just as well, if not better today, than they did yesterday. Sure their bits may be bigger and flabbier in parts but they still look fabulous!
Fashion can be your friend. Stop playing victim. Step out from behind the age barrier and just have fun. The privilege of getting older is that we can just be ourselves. Please, please, please...be bothered and be you.
Until next time.
Ciao bellas!
H.G.
xx.
Related Link: Image is from the fab Note Couture range of stationery.
