Apologies in advance – this will be a rambling post with minimal fashion content.

I am turning 40 in August. I’ll be spending the next 7 months, give or take, sorting out my many mixed feelings about this. I would like to be able to say that they don’t exist, that this milestone is no big deal to me, that it isn’t even a milestone. But that would be a lie. I am trying to be better about confronting my self-lies, and also about sitting with difficult emotions instead of pushing them away and pretending they don’t exist. And even resisting the urge to “fix” them, which is my always my first instinct. That, too, feels like a kind of denial.

Reading Pema Chodron’s Start Where You Are was the nudge I needed to try a new approach: to get comfortable just sitting with the “ickiness” – feelings or thoughts that are challenging. That contradict who I believe (or want) myself to be. I want to better understand what lies at their root. It’s not always self-evident. I want to sit with them, without judgment, until I get to a point where I can release them, without judgment. That is the goal, anyway.

Not all my feelings around turning 40 and this season of life fall into the “icky” category. In this case, it’s the very fact that my feelings are quite contradictory and all over the place that creates the challenge; trying to reconcile them feels like an unmoveable burden. In fairness, this is not an unusual state of affairs for someone who is a 4W3 type; inner conflict and contradiction is our nature and I’ve learned to cope with a certain amount of it as part of my “standard operating procedure”. At certain times, however, it starts to weigh too heavily and when it does, it’s usually a sign that self-work is required.

As I do the work, I am going to focus on a mantra which has given me solace before: what you don’t have, you don’t need it now.

Yes, that is a U2 lyric. Fight me.

It’s a good grounding mantra for someone who is as incredibly privileged as I am, but inclined to focus on what could be better (externally and within). Along with practicing intentional gratitude, reminding myself that I have (and am) everything I need for this moment in time is reassuring. My BFF posted this on her IG stories last week, and it resonated in much the same way:

Around this time of year, I like to set a “theme” to guide my overall mindset for the months ahead. I don’t remember my exact word for 2019, but it was something around the idea of preparation and build-up. I felt like 39 was going to be the calm before the … well, not so much the storm, but an important new phase of my life. It was a quiet year of gathering strength. And yet: I don’t feel ready. I felt more ready this time last year, to be honest. Today, I feel soft and squishy, like a bug whose rock has been unexpectedly turned over. And I feel stuck in that vulnerable spot. And rather than try to build some false sense of forward momentum, I am going to just stop and sit here for a while.

Maybe that needs to be my word for 2020: here.

It is what it is. Here. Now.

Steampunk Lite

I really like the print of this Clover Canyon top. It’s vaguely steampunk-ish and visually arresting. It makes quite a statement … but it’s also the opposite of versatile. Long sleeves and the stiff scuba-like material make it hard to layer under blazers, and the cropped length creates additional limitations. I was considering whether to get rid of it, but couldn’t quite give up on that cool print. Then I had the bright (though not particularly original) idea of layering it over not under things. Ahh – a new world of possibilities. This linen shirt was a good first option, as the lace frill at the bottom adds some length and also a nice bit of contrast. It’s a simple but effective combination, which got lots of comments on Instagram. Not that I’m all about compliments on social media but … well, don’t mind if I take them all, mwaahaha.

Notes: Clover Canyon top (consignment, $25); For Cynthia top (thrifted, $4); Aritzia pants (thrifted, $8); J. Crew shoes (retail, $80).

Yennefer Goes to Law School

Did ya think you’d be done with the Witcher content so soon? Think again. I call this my Yennefer-goes-to-law-school outfit, although to be honest, most days I wish I had gone to Aretuza instead. I mean, minus the not-having-any-kids part; I’d miss those little rascals. But, yeah, a little magic wouldn’t hurt now and then. I guess I’ll stick to the whole outfit glamour-ing business, which is not nearly as impressive but fun on an achievable level for a Muggle like me. Sorry, mixing up my fandoms now. Anyway. It’s hard to go wrong with black and white, and the pieces here are certainly not the kind to let you down. This faux leather skirt is one of my fave recent purchases, and it works quite well with the AllSaints blouse that’s one of my old fave purchases. Not to mention the shoes, which were one of my first and most favourite designer thrift finds ever. Good stuff all around.

Notes: AllSaints top (thrifted, $4); Smythe blazer (thrifted, $11); Oak & Fort skirt (thrifted, $12); Manolo Blahnik shoes (thrifted, $14).

Trench Chic

I didn’t know how much I needed a trench-style dress until I found this Talbots number at my local thrift store. That’s the beauty of thrifting, I guess. I even paid up for it because I could tell the (vintage) quality was excellent. It’s a heavy linen material, similar to my (also vintage) Ungaro dress – not as prone to wrinkling, and with a nice drape to it. I wish it was more of a midi style, because that’s my preferred length these days, but that’s a small quibble. I made up the difference by wearing almost-over-the-knee slouchy boots, and I loved the resulting City Adventurer vibe.

Notes: Talbots dress (thrifted, $20); Equipment shirt (gifted); Stuart Weitzman boots (thrifted $20).

I’ve referenced this in passing in recent posts, but I thought it would be worthwhile writing in greater depth about my current sources of style inspiration. My style obsessions, if you will. While you may not share them exactly, you may be interested in my process for adapting/incorporating inspiration into my outfit planning.

First up, Jo March.

Y’all know about my mixed feelings about the new Little Women movie but one thing that I unabashedly loved about it was the costuming, especially for Jo. The first time we see her onscreen – in her “independent lady writer in New York” mode – I turned to my best friend and said “I need her entire wardrobe”. Something about the silhouette and proportions – voluminous long skirts, waistcoats, and tailored little jackets – just spoke to me.

Apart from the waistcoats, which have become my #1 thrift goal, I already have a lot of pieces that fit the Jo aesthetic. This is a sign. To me, inspiration doesn’t mean copying, nor does it mean buying a whole new wardrobe. If I had to do that to be able to put together an “inspired by” outfit, I would have to rethink whether that particular inspiration really suited me or not. Sometimes, it’s okay to admire someone’s style without making it yours. My goal is to hone in on the mood/essence/vibe of an outfit that attracts my eye, and figure out how to infuse that into my own outfits as filtered through my personal style preferences. That way, when I wear that outfit, I’m expressing a particular mood not simply cos-playing.

Jo’s style dovetails nicely with my Adventurer (and, to a lesser extent, Prince) avatar and represents a direction I had been wanting to explore – i.e. doing more of a “19th century lady explorer” thing than a “Indiana Jones in professor mode” thing (think skirts instead of pants and slightly less tweed).

My other current style obsession is The Witcher.

I found the show highly entertaining in spite (or maybe because) of my extremely low expectations. To put it bluntly, I started watching it as a joke because I thought it would be terrible … and got sucked into its (pretty formulaic, let’s not pretend) storyline and charmed by its main protagonists. The best part is that it doesn’t take itself too seriously and it’s a huge amount of fun. I love Geralt, bad wig and all, because he’s reliably deadpan in a world full of ridiculous propositions – monsters! dragons! enchantments! curses! surprise children! evil armies on the march! – and has a way with monosyllabic words of the expletive variety. I also enjoy powerful witches, so I guess I was predisposed to like Yennefer (even though her “crisis of identity” plotline kinda bored me, tbh). She happens to have a killer wardrobe, which helps – very much a Prince aesthetic, with maybe a little Artist thrown in.

My main takeaways from The Witcher are: all-black and black-and-white outfits (for which, of course, I need little encouragement); long, streamlined silhouettes with nipped-in waists; and LOTS of texture. I have been incorporating leather into my outfits whenever I can for a while now, and The Witcher is giving me some new ideas.

What’s inspiring you at the moment?