on blending in

what we stand to lose when we don't socialize outside our OOTD comfort zone

Photo by Adi Goldstein on Unsplash

After following Ann Helen Petersen’s account closely this month, I’ve been sucked into the vortex that is Bama Rush. You could look it up if you don’t know about it, but maybe you shouldn’t, because you’ll end up like me–watching endless loops of dorm decorations, make up tutorials, and OOTD (rundowns of daily outfits, including the many rings and bangles, which most often are the brand I’d never heard of: enewton). In the most basic sense, it’s a group of women new to the campus who essentially try out for membership to a sorority. (Read Petersen’s interesting assessment of the whole situation here.)

There’s something at once so foreign and then familiar about this spectacle. I didn’t participate in Greek Life, and I didn’t go to school in the south. And I still don’t wear half the amount of foundation that apparently every girl 16-25 now applies with many sponges, sticks, and brushes. (Although I did just order a Merit Beauty five-minute bag, which includes a foundation stick, so never say never!) But do I ever know that feeling of starting something new–excitement married with dread–hopeful for a fresh start and wanting to belong. And just before I grow too self-righteous about these sorority women and their cloned clothing, I must admit clothing–particularly the stuff everyone else is wearing–has always played an outsized role in my approach to acclimating to new environments.

In high school, Patagonia fleeces were like a badge of admittance to something, and I didn’t earn mine until I finally convinced my parents to get me one for Christmas my junior year. College initially informed me that stores existed outside of Abercrombie & Fitch and The Express, and I took careful note of all the Diesel jeans and Kate Spade bags. Later, after transferring to school in DC, I efficiently absorbed the pearl earrings and David Yurman baubles, the Longchamp bags, the Barbour coats, the Hunter boots. Oh, and the Pucci scarves tied up as halter shirts (god do I wish I could still do that!). Maybe law school was the one extended period where I stopped noticing these things so much–we were all just trying to survive–although, cue shopping for Theory suits and Tory Burch flats for my summer associate position.

And now, in this stage I like to call I-moved-to-the-south-in-my-late-thirties (ahem, for a few more weeks) . . . I’ve been caught trying (and sometimes failing) to pair long flowing dresses with fashion sneakers. Because, quite frankly, that’s what I see around me most regularly in my daily life, and I still can’t resist that urge to try to fit in.

Looking back at that girl, twenty years younger than I am now, I know she slipped through my fingers. Maybe I’ll say that about myself as I exist in this very moment when I’m sixty. “I tried to hold onto her–a woman in her prime at forty (as of next month)–but she slipped away.” Where does all that time go? I wonder how much I devoted simply to trying to blend in and for how long I’ll continue that practice. 

According to scientific journalist Lydia Denworth, “similarity has been recognized as a hallmark of friendship since at least before the Ancient Greek and presumably before that.” Carolyn Parkinson, associate professor of psychology at UCLA, suggests there could be advantages to seeking out similar people: they “might share similar goals and assumptions and experiences and that could help foster cohesions, empathy, and collective action.”

On some level this makes complete sense to me; and on another I find the whole tenet disheartening.  Are we all just rushing our own sororities and fraternities throughout life, dressing the part to signal that we are similar? And how does social media compound this tendency? Are we making things more efficient for our worst instincts?

I think about this when my ten-year-old comes home from school asking for specific brands–some that I’ve never heard of. Where is she learning about them? She doesn’t even have a phone. A friend has suggested that older siblings who absorb the brands du jour on social media rub off on their younger siblings. Who knows though: maybe she learned them the old-fashioned way—by observing what’s around her and trying to blend in.

Last Friday a friend invited me to attend a poetry reading hosted by a local writing organization, Charlotte Lit. We braved the sweltering heat to listen to poems interlaced with the chirping cicadas and rumbles of the train. Jay Ward, Charlotte’s inaugural Poet Laureate, emceed the event, and delivered some of his own work, which was such a treat. And Tiffany Clarke Harrison read an excerpt of her book Blue Hour, a pick for President Obama’s summer reading list this year. 

I didn’t have a clue what brand anyone else was wearing.

I don’t think it’s categorically bad to care about appearance or to observe trends or to express oneself through clothing. There’s a lot to appreciate about fashion. It’s the status signaling that bothers me, the potential limiting of experience and exposure that accompanies blending in. With those Bama Rush Tik Toks at top of mind, I’m thinking more about what I’m saying (or not saying) with my clothes. And what we risk losing when we don’t socialize outside the sorority.

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[books]

Women Are The Fiercest Creatures by Andrea Dunlop

Hello Beautiful by Ann Napalitano

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[things that caught my eye]

I met Alexis Barad-Cutler in a mediation hut somewhere in Manhattan a few years back. I was struck then by her simultaneous skill and vulnerability in creating community around topics like birthing experiences. Her piece for Today on her run-in with cosmetic surgery and Gen Z’s seemingly increased comfort with more and more cosmetic procedures really hit a chord: “I wonder if there’s room for this generation, or any generation, to ever feel comfortable in their own skin.”

A dear friend sent me Kelly Corrigan’s podcast on mattering, and it’s a must-listen if you want to learn more about the pitfalls of achievement culture. It had me reflecting on my messages to my own kids: “whatever we talk about the most is understandably what our kids come to believe are our highest values.” And oh, this: “The self becomes stronger not by being praised but by being known.”

Loved Abby Rasminsky’s post on getting back into the swing of things: “These weeks are sticky and unpredictable and tough — things get forgotten (lunch, homework assignment, an email, an appointment, a pickup time) — and I’m trying to just let them be what they are, an in-between space where nothing is quite settled and I might be really tired and frayed.”

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[best thing I cooked]

What do 90+ degree days call for? Eggplant and Italian sausage and pasta, obviously. Four out of five family members ate seconds of this dish we made following Caroline Chambers’ Sorta Pasta Alla Norma recipe. So appreciate her tips on how to alter the recipes. Here we made the full orzo version for the kids as well as a lower-carb version for the adult who doesn’t eat pasta and the other adult who at times feels compelled to follow him on that path.