Can We Talk 2

Fashion Trends and Oldies

         The latest in jewelry is mixed metals. As someone who was trained not to mix yellow and white gold, I have a hard time mixing silver, copper, pewter, black metal, and yellow gold-like. (These days even cheap jewelry is chemically treated not to turn your fingers green.) I did break down and buy a necklace that looked great on the model that featured gold tone chain connecting simulated wood, white plastic, and black synthetic something loops. Only after I put it on did I realize it's not symmetrical. My lifelong training tells me it should look the same on each side hanging down from my neck. I studied this thing, and it's not possible.

         Ok, I sort of gave up a little on white before Memorial Day and after Labor Day. I was raised to do "winter white" for Easter, but now they do both all year long. I still have a drawer full of dress gloves. They're never coming back in style. They're of no use to anyone, except maybe a theater company storage wardrobe. I even have a few hats on the top shelf in the closet. They're never coming back either.

         As for shoes, for ages I couldn't or wouldn't buy new shoes because I couldn't find a decent pair. I finally realized the 90's were gone, and those styles were never going to be reproduced again. I gave in to newer styles, but only the more comfortable ones. If I can't have the fashion shoe I want, I'll just do "laid back" instead. I loved the days when shoes and purses matched. Those days faded away a couple of decades ago.

         When it comes to jewelry, my favorite times were the colorful costume jewelry days. You'd color coordinate your outfits with your accessories, so you'd need earrings and beads in a variety of colors. I also like the gold add-a-bead chains. I have mine and my Mom's. Nobody wears them any longer. The chains were fine and get knotted in the jewelry box. I should get them all melted down into something else. It cost a lot more to obtain them than any money I can get for selling them to a gold dealer. In the early 2000's, I remembered seeing all the simple metal chains, not like the heavier long chains of the disco age, and hating them. I finally saw some older women wearing them in church. I decided that if they could step up to current styles, I could, too, a generation younger than they.

         As for clothing styles, I hate the peek-a-boo shoulders or upper arm cutaways. If they only appeared on dressy dresses or just beach wear, it might not be so bad. But they're everywhere on every kind of clothing, so it's an overdone trend. My shoulders aren't worth peeking at, but I tire of seeing them on everybody else. Those loose flowy tops, some with a tight fitting tank, seem like they would cover a muffin top or disguise an early pregnancy. But they only work on skinny girls. The majority of women wearing them look heavier or puffier in them. So they don't work for slimming.

         No one wants to look stuck in the 70's or any past decade. But it is hard to adjust to trends as we get older. We want to hold onto the comfortable. Why spend more money to fit in with the crowd whose opinion really doesn't matter as much to us now as it did when we were young? We can act our age and still make adjustments to the changing times. Some trends we can adopt.