Resolutions vs. Goals

Well, 2012 has come.  Almost two weeks ago, but who's counting?

I don't make new years resolutions, haven't since I was forced to, and this year will be no different.  But, I do set goals.  Goals are different from resolutions in that there is a lesser guilt factor in not completing a goal as opposed to "breaking" a resolution.

As a child, I was forced to sit down and come up with some fancy resolution for the year, write it down, share it with my parents who would then use it against me for the remainder of the year.  NYE was a ton o'fun and just another day that followed the huge disappointment that was Christmas.

I have always thought of rules as something meant to be broken and resolutions as setup for failure.  The pressure to keep a resolution, especially one that was forced upon you, is more than anyone can handle.  So, I set goals. My goals are the things I decide should be done by me, they don't include anyone else, and may or may not ever be "complete" but rather something that is worked on over time.  I have had a goal since I was a teenager: to avoid obesity at all cost.  This is a lifetime goal.  Now, had I set that as a resolution for a single year, would that mean that the year after I could say fuck-it and become obese? Or, fail all together and just say fuck-it that year and eat cookies? No.

I have set a new goal: I am going to learn to dress myself.  This may sound like a given to anyone else, but what I mean is that I am going to stop wishing I had some sense of style and just start having one.  The one I see in my head of me.  Every once in a while I make some effort to actually put a coordinated outfit together, I will even go as far as to add a piece of jewelry or two to complete the look.  This will happen for about three days and then I will run out of wardrobe choices, creativity, energy and focus.

My boyfriends eight year old daughter said to me not too long ago that I'm kind of like a tom-boy and plain while my friend "A" is more "fashioney" (I love eight year old words) and does her hair pretty and wears pretty outfits and shoes and jewelry. I don't remember exactly how she said it, but basically, it was in disapproval of the way I could be mistaken for wearing her dads clothes, which I am guilty of, the majority of the time.  Huh...thanks kid...  I love her to pieces for her brutal honesty.

Part of the problem is that my wardrobe is not very big, or very diverse.  I wear jeans and T-shirts, usually in shades of white, gray and black.  Thus, my entire wardrobe coordinates in a tom-boy sort of way.  Almost all my clothing can be worn with my ugly combat boots or my super awesome Harley boots, the two or three dresses I own included - and I like it that way.  I don't like to wear anything that is fussy, has too much pattern, color, color splotches, animals, animal patterns, etc.  And I'm weird about textures in fabric AND the fabric itself.  I also don't like anything touching my neck because it feels like I'm on the verge of being strangled all day.

I like shoes though.  Probably an understatement and maybe a little bit too much.  I have my favorite go to shoes for every day (boots) and I never seem to have a problem with shoes.  The only problem I have with shoes, if one could even consider this a problem, is where to store them all when I'm not wearing them and how to make them accessible enough that I can wear any of them at any given time.  Shoes are easy. And fun. And always fit.  The size of my foot doesn't fluctuate the way the rest of me seems to on a regular basis.

I do have some clothes that hang up, in the same basic color scheme with the addition of a couple purple and one orange shirt, but they don't get worn that often AND the moon, stars and planets have to align perfectly for me to be comfortable enough in them to actually leave the house without a hasty change in the closet itself leaving clothes strewn about for me to clean up later because now I'm running late because I feel like this orange shirt makes me stand out too much or my arms look especially fat it in today, etc.  If only everyone had my "problems". Right? (wink)

I have fat jeans, skinny jeans, jeans with cool back pockets, faded jeans, baggy jeans, jeans with holes in them, jeans to wear with heels, jeans to wear with flip flops, which are usually the same as the jeans I wear with heels thus the frayed hems on ALL my jeans (I'm short).  I have big T-shirts, small T-shirts, T-shirts with race logos, fitted T-shirts, V-neck T-shirts, scoop neck T-shirts, even a T-shirt with buttons down the back.  Out of the entire T-shirt collection, I believe 2 are olive green, one is tan, one is purple but it's about to hit the trash, one has a flower on it (twas a gift) and all are in some stage of "old" looking and have at least one hole in them giving the impression that I live in a nest of moths.  Really, I think my washing machine just gets very very hungry because I have no idea where these holes come from.  Or, it's full of razor-blades that only seem to touch my clothing.

I have on occasion, determined to make a change, gone out and actually purchased new clothing, something out of the norm, a color, a fabric other than 100% cotton and then immediately returned them all to the store for lack of ability to work them into my wardrobe or just felt that it wasn't me.  Stacy & Clinton would be appalled.

Disapproval is evident 

So, as a 37, soon to be 38 year old woman, my goal is to figure out how the hell to dress myself in some sort of adult fashion.  I do actually have lofty goals but am completely lost in how to achieve them and generally end up dressed like this.

$7 Lynyrd Skynyrd T, Jeans AND a watch, how creative!

when there is this stylish and perfectly accessorized person waiting to get out:

Still in Jeans and probably a T-shirt in there somewhere and awesome black fingernails - wishing I could see her feet though...

The problem with the stylish and perfectly accessorized me waiting to get out is that the layered look I love so much, requires more than one article of clothing for each body quadrant.

 

For example, the outfit below requires three tops! THREE! Well, two and a jacket.  That's three times the cost of just one shirt, and how on earth would I know that those items coordinate!?!  The top is sequined, the shirt is denim and the jacket is who knows what.  Am I really the only woman that just doesn't get this?

The boots (awesome BTW) and jeans are a no brainer, but the top half, and that fabulous ring, is a complete mystery to me!

So included in my goal is purchasing clothing. Not clothing from the $10 T-Shirt rack at Old Navy and loading up on two white, two black and a gray to get me through a season until they become too full of holes to be considered appropriate work attire, but actual womens clothing as opposed to the androgynous wardrobe I currently own.

Perhaps once I have not dressing myself like a toddler down, I'll move on to accessorizing.  I won't even talk about my hair right now, that's a later discussion.

Or, I'll just stay forever tom-boy with my ugly boots, leather belt & jacket that I've had since I was 19 and collection of drab T-shirts.  After all, it is just a goal...