Prime
Leave fashion for the fashionable
Author, Stella Riunga Rop.
What you need to know:
- Of course, the fashionable among you will recoil in horror at such a suggestion.
Brethren, I am seriously considering coming up with a work uniform for myself. I think all I need is a set of seven, different colour V-neck tops with the days of the week printed on them, a corresponding set of trousers (and of course, the occasional pretty dress in case I start forgetting I’m female), a few sensible shoes and hey presto, good to go!
Of course, the fashionable among you will recoil in horror at such a suggestion. “Where’s the fun in knowing what you are going to wear every day?” For me, the fun lies in not having a mini-life crisis every morning about “What will I wear today?”.
You see, friends, fashion has very rarely been kind to the body God gave me. Jeans on a 5”2 frame?
The minute they are bought I have to quickly spirit them away to a tailor to hem the edges, praying that whoever is handling the scissors doesn’t get too carried away and leave me with an unusable pair of long shorts (like some sort of colonial chief).
What about a nice tailor-made kitenge dress? Very good idea. But allow me to take you back to 2018 when I was a nursing mother and urgently needed a kitenge dress for a wedding.
I thought the brief I had handed the tailor was pretty straightforward: a dress with two discreet allowances for breastfeeding that I could attend a function in. I did get my discreet panels.
But, what I also ended up with was the appearance of a large, well-fed but malevolent spider moving about in a mass of heavy cotton. And that, dear brothers and sisters, cured me of the desire to ever have another tailor-made kitenge piece.
And now to my wardrobe, where a beautiful pair of high-heeled pumps lies resting in peace, because my feet have refused all attempts to defy gravity and balance in high heels. How does everyone else do it? Sheer willpower? Superglue? Maybe superpowers?
Alas! These feminine secrets were never whispered in my ear. See why I need my uniform? Leave fashion for the fashionable!
