sartorial scarcity

I am fortunate to be married to a man who has a fairly good sense of style. He provides actual, useful assistance when I ask him which outfit is best (the preferred type of request), or whether something looks acceptable (dicey, but we manage). And, when we can manage it, he’s fabulous to have along when I'm clothes shopping.
His mantra, which I’ve found hugely useful: “DON’T SETTLE.” If it doesn’t jump right out at me as being great, I don’t get it. It’s a more confident way to shop. It assumes that there WILL be fabulous-looking clothing out there. (we’re talking more about ‘fit’ than actual style here, though style, of course, is part of the equation.) All too often, I’m willing to go with something I can merely stand the sight of myself in. But Matt helps me aspire to greater things.

He even went so far recently as to buy me some clothes from a casual clothing store we go to from time to time. To turn a phrase coined by a friend, apathy has been the enemy of the pants lately, and I’ve gained a few pounds. I think I’ve not-exercised my way out of most of my clothes. Not a good scheme, since I find it preferable to go about my public business fully clothed, and preferably not in super-tight, ill-fitting garb.

So we got a few things, but we didn’t find any shorts on that pass. We returned to the same store a few weeks later, which was a couple of nights ago.

Again, no shorts. Sadly. You’ll not be seeing much of my chubby, pasty legs any time soon.

Our outing did have a happy outcome, though. What to my wandering eye did appear … but cute cute shoes! Lizzy thought they were precious, too, and that girl definitely has a sense of style. We eagerly modeled them for Matt.

As I’ve hinted, Matt elects to use sweet, encouraging, subtle forms of communication to get his opinion across. So when he doesn’t say much right away, I jump to the conclusion that he doesn’t like something. Most of the time, that’s fine. But for these shoes…

(me) “What’s wrong with them? Don’t you like them?”
(Lizzy) “Yeah, what’s wrong with them, Daddy? Don’t you like them?”

(Matt) “Well, they’re … PLAID.”

I bought them anyway. Rules are meant to be broken, right? And opinions meant to be ignored. After all, a woman mustn’t cede ALL fashion rights to the man. Am I right, ladies? Or am I the only one out there with a worse fashion sense than my husband?