In this day and age, everyone wants to be a blogger. Case in point, one of the best commercials on tv today by Oscar Mayer....
"Is it OK if I quit my job and start a blog?" "NO!" always makes me smile when I hear that... and the funniest, "Iiii'm going to become facebook friends with our babysitter..." If you haven't seen it, you must! You can find it here: Oscar Mayer "it's YES food"
We've all had fantasies at one point or another of giving it all up, throwing in the towel, and having the luxury of working from home. Maybe on a blog (it seems easy, doesn't it?), starting an Etsy store of vintage finds à la InvenTori,
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| (Tori Spelling's latest venture when she's not in labor.) |
or living the life of Carrie Bradshaw - writing one article a month as a journalist in between martini & champ-filled lunch dates with her closest girlfriends...
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| (Still trying to figure out how she afforded the rent living single in that killer apartment....and we're talking West Village too, people!) |
It's gotta be that easy, right? Hell, why aren't we all doing it?
...And so today, I begin my new 'hobby' as a blogger. Can't say it's a real job yet, those require big girl paychecks. I'm an unemployed fashion designer from Brooklyn, NY transplanted here in the good ol' Low-country, Charleston SC. What brought me here? The love of my husband and a job transfer... his of course. And suddenly at 27, I've defaulted to being the housewife I've never wanted to be.
I've only been here for a short time, but this city definitely forces its charm on you. I've quickly become the quintessential lover of sweet tea (that's kind of a requirement though, right?), tolerant of 90+ degree heat, and a rather loyal listener of the WEZL 103.5 country. (Pronounced 'weasel', all the better.) So I wish I could say that I hit some easy button to become a blogger, but I didn't. Frankly, I don't have a choice. I need to maintain some sort of self expression. You see, as much as I've come to admire this charming city, there is one thing that it lacks for me - A fashion industry. Sure, it has its own fashion week, rightfully so... everyone is drop-dead gorgeous here..... but, is said fashion week employing designers making 6-figure salaries? Please tell me where if you know. No, the designers in CFW are from all over the east coast, hailing mainly from one would assume, New York City, and a rare few locals that have been lucky enough to have found amazing means of finance or some $weet $outhern parents. The best designers hitch a ride from New York, show their collections (i.e. Rag & Bone), and then hitch a ride back to the city of dreams. I can't hitch that ride back.... I'm here now. Enter the bittersweet from stage left.
The bigger question for me, and also maybe where I'm totally at fault for being such a cautiously prepared being, is how are these designers launching and staying afloat in this economy? I just don't find it a sound decision to start something that is ultimately so risky in this environment. Also anyone who knows me could tell you; failure is never in my cards. I always work to succeed. I'm also a little squeamish of the though of never being good enough. Confession: I haven't touched my sewing machines since my senior thesis collection, circa 2007. I am also completely terrified at the small pool of local fabric stores to shop in. We're not in Kansas anymore Toto. Joann's and Hancock DO NOT COUNT... blasphemy!
I've had a lot of people tell me to shut up. I've had my husband remind me numerous times since we've gotten here about how strenuous my job as a designer had been. How upset I would be most nights after a very long day at work. How I'd struggle to find the creativity that made me enter into this field in the first place. How I was being ruled by the ever popular golden handcuffs of a fat paycheck. How I dreamed of days when life was just about enjoying the little things... that really are the big things. And here I am. I guess I wished for it enough to finally have it... and I'm being a bitch by wishing for my old life back. Listen, you can keep the 700sqft apartment in the sky - keep the smelly, slimy, stifling commute; keep your bums, your ridiculous cost of living, your defunct grocery shopping, your over-populated sidewalks, your killer traffic, your corrupt police force and transit authority;
I just want my career back. I was good at it. I enjoyed being good at it. I was never good at anything in my life before that. It was something I cultivated myself. I took nothing and made something of myself....and for that I'm proud. No one showed me how to create a portfolio to get into one of the best fashion school's in the US. I went to Borders and bought a book on fashion illustration and taught myself. No one told me how to interview, or how to dress, or how to sell myself on being "so New York" so they believed that I could handle being a design student in their school without getting eaten up alive. I was born and raised in a small seaside town off New Jersey's map.... no one had heard of Cape May, NJ in 2002. "Where is that?!" Again, I bought myself a book on Donna Karan and followed suit. If she can be successful, well I'm going to be just like her. That foundation got me pretty far, I guess. I was so passionate. I wanted it SO bad. The 10,000 other students vying for that same spot didn't intimidate me. Students from Fashion Industries high school, students with so much talent that blew me to pieces... but, my mind told me differently. What makes me so much different from them? I knew I had what it took and I fought for it every step of the way. So the saddest thing for me now, is here I sit, trying to figure out what my next move will be.
I know everyone is looking for some sort of break and some people will even pay for it - oh hey, Rebecca Black! - but this blog for me is just going to be about taking it day by day. Pulling out of me what is holding me back, what I hope will inevitably propel me forward... because I know things happen for a reason. It's cliche but they wouldn't say it if it weren't true. I know there's more in store. Exciting, somewhat terrifying, and beyond anything I could imagine right now. When I look back on that 17 yr old girl, this me would've told her she's just a little cray cray, but the best part about her is she would've just proved me wrong.
So, I give you my blogger promises:
- I will share fashion. Not the latest, hottest, up-to-date runway yah yah's - but the more compelling, what gets my fire going, kind of fashion updates.
- It won't all be fashion. Let's be honest, fashion is art - art is fashion. Designers are inspired by their surroundings. You'll get to see what inspires me or I'll get to see what inspires me. It's kind of like, just getting it down on paper.
- This will not be a journal. I'll share my thoughts, motivations, and vices, but they're not for you - they're for me. Still my point is that this will not be a diary of sorts. No Tavi Gevinson-esque postings. Really, who doesn't like looking through a little window of someone's soul in this generation of social media whore-ism?
- In other Tavi news, don't send out the grammar police on me if my English is not on par with hers. My parents are not Literature professors and awesome hippie artists. God, why not?!
And, for some visual appeal, check out my Pinterest.... it's prrreettyy. (You've got it! I've got nothing else better to do.)
