As a five year old.....
- Dressy ? Yes. Because my mom force-dressed me for every occasion with pinks,lace,frills and all that's girly.
- Did I look like a girl after all the effort? No.
- Who influenced me? My brothers. So I was generaly tagging along wherever my cousin brothers went and did. Be it walking in mud, climbing trees, finding tadpoles and earthworms, being dirt itself I religiously followed. And amma used to tell me I even started looking ( what is the opposite of biologically evolved ?) like one of them
As a 10 year old...
- Enlightened yet? Not really but the first signs of womenhood did surface. I was keen on how I behaved. Yeah the girly giggles and social networks (on a class to class basis) did begin. But still I wasn't the girl you would imagine.
- Looks? Didn't matter still. Wasn't really consious of the way I looked - bugs bunny teeth et all!
- Influences....Friends, mother and my cousins
As a 15 year old...
- What the story? The girl child has arrived :)...and in her teens...So its shopping with Amma, gossiping with friends about boys, TV and movies, wishing for sleep overs that never happened and holidays with cousins.
- Looks in all dimensions mattered for I was short, fat, curly haired ( oh don't forget the frizz) and had my teeth caged..what more of a disaster do you need to destroy a gals teens????
- Influences : Movies, Friends, Acha ( only on the professional angle) and Amma
As a 20 year old..
- Was happy with myself except for the extra kilos and the glasses ( which I barely wore ) and the curly hair and the......oh that's a never ending list ye know!
- Dressing mattered like never before to camoflouge the shortcomings and get that approval from friends...yeah only friends...Even if Amma said "Mole that's a shabby outfit" I would retort " But my friends loved it"
- Influences : Very much the same Friends, Movies, Amma and Acha.....in that order :)..Infact I guess this was the little worls I lived in
Now I leave the Age categorisation and shift to a walk through from where I left you to the present scenario...yeah another of those age related complexities I admit.
I still had the unkept looks. I wondered how girls walked about 365 days of the year with shampooed ad-silky hair ,smooth hairless skin and a slim stature...sheshhhh! I was the opposite of all this and more.
Not that I didn't try to look cared for... its just that I couldn't get that look. I was never fresh except for the brief 1/2 hr when we had classes at 6.15 am and I had to plait my wet hair tight, dripping with H2O that remained until it naturally evaporated giving birth to frizzy split ends.
Professional upliftment and a job does so much to ones confidence level. It didn't do much to me. Firstly because my profession took me for a ride before I was bestowed with the qualification. So when I did finally acheive it ...it didn't really make a mark on my attitude ...good or bad I still don't know. And I was very much the dress up-only- for a special occasion.
Then I got married and had to satisfy the Indian tradition of 'looking married' for a while...for a very little while ...until all the pre wedding grooming lasted ..It was back to being the 'sloppy'self again..which included
- Picking up the most reachable outfit out of the messy wardrobe
- To powder or not to powder depended on the secs left out of the 5 minutes allotted for dressing
- one pair of sandals and one bag however drab they are if they are working they work!
- The max time I spend is on choosing earrings....I love earrings in all shapes and sizes :)
Down the line motherhood became a reason for my ways....the weight gain was justified as well...so now you have a rolly polly ungroomed slop who haunted the house by walking around in oversized feeding nighties all day and night. The scene changed a bit after rejoining office but the shift was limited to the dress change from one XL to another....
And I barely had any influences either. The only thing that mattered is the TIME
Life today hasn't changed. ....I want to change but can't. I have orders,advice and requests to get the 'look'. But they all remain jus that
and I remain....jus that.
PS. Too long a blog huh!...jus to remind myself of one of the zillion things I need to work on.....:)
- Dressy ? Yes. Because my mom force-dressed me for every occasion with pinks,lace,frills and all that's girly.
- Did I look like a girl after all the effort? No.
- Who influenced me? My brothers. So I was generaly tagging along wherever my cousin brothers went and did. Be it walking in mud, climbing trees, finding tadpoles and earthworms, being dirt itself I religiously followed. And amma used to tell me I even started looking ( what is the opposite of biologically evolved ?) like one of them
As a 10 year old...
- Enlightened yet? Not really but the first signs of womenhood did surface. I was keen on how I behaved. Yeah the girly giggles and social networks (on a class to class basis) did begin. But still I wasn't the girl you would imagine.
- Looks? Didn't matter still. Wasn't really consious of the way I looked - bugs bunny teeth et all!
- Influences....Friends, mother and my cousins
As a 15 year old...
- What the story? The girl child has arrived :)...and in her teens...So its shopping with Amma, gossiping with friends about boys, TV and movies, wishing for sleep overs that never happened and holidays with cousins.
- Looks in all dimensions mattered for I was short, fat, curly haired ( oh don't forget the frizz) and had my teeth caged..what more of a disaster do you need to destroy a gals teens????
- Influences : Movies, Friends, Acha ( only on the professional angle) and Amma
As a 20 year old..
- Was happy with myself except for the extra kilos and the glasses ( which I barely wore ) and the curly hair and the......oh that's a never ending list ye know!
- Dressing mattered like never before to camoflouge the shortcomings and get that approval from friends...yeah only friends...Even if Amma said "Mole that's a shabby outfit" I would retort " But my friends loved it"
- Influences : Very much the same Friends, Movies, Amma and Acha.....in that order :)..Infact I guess this was the little worls I lived in
Now I leave the Age categorisation and shift to a walk through from where I left you to the present scenario...yeah another of those age related complexities I admit.
I still had the unkept looks. I wondered how girls walked about 365 days of the year with shampooed ad-silky hair ,smooth hairless skin and a slim stature...sheshhhh! I was the opposite of all this and more.
Not that I didn't try to look cared for... its just that I couldn't get that look. I was never fresh except for the brief 1/2 hr when we had classes at 6.15 am and I had to plait my wet hair tight, dripping with H2O that remained until it naturally evaporated giving birth to frizzy split ends.
Professional upliftment and a job does so much to ones confidence level. It didn't do much to me. Firstly because my profession took me for a ride before I was bestowed with the qualification. So when I did finally acheive it ...it didn't really make a mark on my attitude ...good or bad I still don't know. And I was very much the dress up-only- for a special occasion.
Then I got married and had to satisfy the Indian tradition of 'looking married' for a while...for a very little while ...until all the pre wedding grooming lasted ..It was back to being the 'sloppy'self again..which included
- Picking up the most reachable outfit out of the messy wardrobe
- To powder or not to powder depended on the secs left out of the 5 minutes allotted for dressing
- one pair of sandals and one bag however drab they are if they are working they work!
- The max time I spend is on choosing earrings....I love earrings in all shapes and sizes :)
Down the line motherhood became a reason for my ways....the weight gain was justified as well...so now you have a rolly polly ungroomed slop who haunted the house by walking around in oversized feeding nighties all day and night. The scene changed a bit after rejoining office but the shift was limited to the dress change from one XL to another....
And I barely had any influences either. The only thing that mattered is the TIME
Life today hasn't changed. ....I want to change but can't. I have orders,advice and requests to get the 'look'. But they all remain jus that
and I remain....jus that.
PS. Too long a blog huh!...jus to remind myself of one of the zillion things I need to work on.....:)
Aha!!... you made me depressed.. If you write like this.. what should be my lines? sob sob.. :-(
ReplyDeleteu know what Buzzy... Ur blogs are brilliant.. u touch every reader with your earnest feelings...
ReplyDeleteand on an another side , u r wicked as well ! u well enough camouflage ur sloppiness with ur great writing skill... hahahah ..
do u know the answer for it ? It is in the book u read - Ladies coupe ...
There is one ammuma character there who dresses up well till her last day of life ..and therte is a quote
" U dont dress for others ... u dress for urself ..when you look urself into the mirror , u should feel happy and be proud of urself " thatz the scale..
As I told u , start living to satisfy " YOU " .I guess it is high time u stop worrying about " others" .. then every damn thing will change ...
- @sranj: Its not about the degree of sloppiness its about what we do about it that counts :)
ReplyDelete- @ssb: Thanks for the compliment :D..and yes like u aptly put it, that sure is a wonderful line but while the ammuma in the book dressed to satisfy herself I can't get to do it....that's why its featured in my to do list :D
ur "TO DO " list is a never ending one .... !!! Dont get me worked up!!!!!!!!! grrrrrrrrrrr
ReplyDelete