I love....fashion?? I love putting together fun outfits! It's so fulfilling.

It's funny to me; as a kid I cared a LOT about what I wore, and got great joy from making matching outfits, but I did not grow up in a family where that interest was nurtured, so I never learned to self-identify as a person who cared about clothes. And then as a teen I re-oriented to try to dress in as invisible a way as possible, because being a neurodivergent teen in high school was hard and that was one of the ways I coped.

Then as a young adult I once again reinvested effort into my personal style, but I didn't realise there could be information out there for learning how to take my outfits to the next level, because I dressed off-trend enough that mainstream fashion resources (and alt fashion resources) didn't strike me as at all likely to be useful! I didn't want to dress in the clothing I saw in magazines, and didn't realise that you can learn things about putting together outfits that you can then apply to other styles. So I did my best but mostly that looked like developing a large wardrobe of statement skirts, and wearing just kind of whatever was easy to find for the rest.

I took a few years off fashion beginning in 2020, because of covid and never leaving home. But eventually I realised that despite the rhetoric I was hearing from other wfh folks, I did not personally find it freeing to dress in sweatpants every day. Rather, it made me feel....disaffected, disconnected, ungrounded, something like that. Like I had closed myself off from investing in being alive and in/of the world.

And so I started again! From the ground up, this time, because in the meantime I'd migrated my gender presentation to no longer involve skirts, and wanted to try a more masc style.

But this time I am not alone. One of my besties is a lolita, and even though I don't dress lolita specifically, there are crossover concepts. And I have learned SO much from them! I started really focusing on fashion again more than two years ago and it's so cool to see my constant growth and improvement over that time. I learned about neckwear, and layering, and online second-hand shopping. And playing with texture and shape and value and headwear and coordinating multiple different patterns in an outfit and so much more! There's so much you can think about in putting together a complete outfit, and I love it.

And I'm not done learning and growing! As I think my history indicates, my interest in fashion has been pretty much lifelong, even if I didn't previously know how to recognise that. So I think this is something I will keep doing in one form or another for the rest of my life!

Of late I've been thinking of giving a proper try to a full ouji coord (ouji is...sort of a boyish version of lolita). I would make it from scratch, because most branded ouji/lolita is sold in one (small) size only, and knowing I'd have to do the work of resizing anyway, I'm just like, why not just put that effort into making custom pieces instead?? (clothes-sewing is another thing I have been leveling up on, in the last year.)

And I am excited to see where else I go as I continue to dress in ways that make me happy, as I continue to live into being myself.