We had some new cotton shirt material come in and one particular pattern caught my eye:
a criss-cross pattern dotted at the junctions. I
like! Naturally, I treated myself to a sweet custom-made shirt.
For those of you who don't know me, I'm a real lazy dresser. And it might amuse you that I'm also a bad but very lucky cook.
As much as I like dressing people, I tend to go for the kind of outfits that require little or no effort to put together. Since I work in an environment where image is pretty important (Superficial? I know.), I usually just stick to the basics and add an accessory here or there to spruce up a bland outfit.
A few days ago, I had an urge to blog before closing up--purely because I was wearing my super awesome one-of-kind polk-a-dot shirt.. Since I was the only one left at the store, I had to ask for assistance with this post...
I'm sure most of you have been approached by a stranger on the street at one point or another as you're happily walking to work, to meet friends, to get to class, to get home, to the grocery store or to wherever. He or she would've have asked you for one of the following: directions, assistance, money, a signature ( because we're all secretly rockstars), food, your business, your phone number (oh, you lucky thangs) and so forth.
Most often, the approachees (not sure if that's a word), would politely decline by shaking their heads or by smiling as they do the hybrid run-walk to dodge further interactions with the approacher.
I wanted to get pictures of my new dotted shirt. So I walked out, stood outside the store and scanned the street for a lucky photographer:
Candidate A: A young girl carrying a trombone, waiting to cross the street.
Candidate B: An old shaky couple holding onto each other for warmth and support.
Candidate C: A bearded man storming down the side walk with a tool box and a ladder.
Candidate D: A boy walking alongside a girl who was pushing her bike, quietly chatting away.
In my mind:
Girl with trombone? Nope. She needs to get somewhere. Probably to catch the bus which is fast approaching.
Shaky couple? Nope. Too shaky. My pictures would turn out blurry.
Bearded man? Nope. He's got his hands full and he looks a bit intimidating.
Boy and girl with bike? OKAY!
I stood there, waiting for them to walk pass me and locked eyes with the boy. Eye contact is important especially when you're asking for help ...and so I thought. The boy looked a little uneasy. I could see he wanted to look at me and wanted to avoid my eyes at the same time. As soon as he got near enough, I stepped forward: "Hey, how's it g-...?"
Before I could finish my sentence, the boy did a
big detour around me...around the dog that was tied to the tree...around the lamp post that was next to the tree...
What the...?
He thought I was a solicitor (especially when I was dressed the way I was dressed).When I realized what was happening, I quickly blurted out everything I wanted to say in 5 seconds flat:
"Hi, I need someone to take my pictures. It's for a fashion blog and I need your help. It won't take long. I promise. Can you help me please? All you have to do is press this button."
Yes, 5 seconds. You try.
The girl pushing the bike smiled at me. "I like fashion blogs. I read them all the time. Here, let me help you."
Yay! I found my photographer!
So here I am, awkwardly posing for strangers in my super awesome polk-a-dot shirt. When I say lazy dresser, I meant it. White shirt, jeans, boots. Everyone has those right? Slap on a tie and VOILA! I'm a professional style consultant. ;)
Here's a close-up of my shirt so you can see the pattern on it. Notice the collar is white? I'm a fan of white collars and white cuffs. They make a shirt look so fancy ;)
