Saturday, August 9, 2008

Ghost dresses

About a year and a half ago, I gave my high school junior and senior prom dresses to my friend Carly, who volunteers with an organization that donates occasion dresses to girls who otherwise wouldn't have them.

Carly has been my friend Tatum's roomate for a year. She very recently moved out of Tatum's apartment, and some of her stuff has been discarded in corners (ostensibly for "someone else" to pick up).

Today I went with my neighbors Aryn and Celeste to Tatum's for dinner. Aryn is Tatum's boyfriend. (Everyone following here?) We walked in the front door and I was standing in the middle of the living room when I looked up and had a very strange experience - My junior prom dress was hanging in the corner. It took me a minute to realize that yes, in fact, it was mine - because out of sight, out of mind, I had forgotten that I had given them to Carly! So I decided to have some fun: I turned to Tatum said Hm, yeah, those are mine! You can imagine the confusion.

Apparently my old prom dresses are not "cool" enough to even donate. I bet you that if I held onto them for another 5 years, the styles would come back into vogue ;) One is a Gunne Sax, the other is Laura Ashley. Oh, yeah, I can hear you ALL laughing; yes, in fact, I went to two proms wearing girly and frilly creations!!

To amuse my friends, I decided to put on a fashion show. I think it's safe to say that not a lot of nearly 35-year old women can wear dresses they wore at 16 and 17 years old. Both of them fit me better now than they did 20 years ago - since now, I have the shoulders of a climber :)

I wonder what message the universe is trying to send me, with the resurfacing of 20 year old memorabilia dresses.


We were tossing around ideas of what I should do with these dresses. Anyone got any input? Celeste suggested that I dye the floral Laura Ashley dress dark blue, since it really fits quite well and I could actually wear it again.... we also tossed around the idea of tie dye, and of making the pink one into a Halloween costume a la "Carrie."

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