Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Learning To Love My Outside

I've been trying to make peace with my appearance lately. It's a struggle for me, which then frustrates me......it's a whole Big Thing. What does it matter what I look like? I'm clean and I smell good. My skin is soft and my teeth are flossed. I've got it covered, right? Ehhh.....

Some days I'm fine with it all, the whole package. I think I need to lose a bit more weight, but I know that it will come off with my marathon training. My skin is pretty okay and I do write about makeup and skin care, so I have a whole lot of products available to me. (Which is my favorite part of the job).

Today, my boyfriend asked me if I'd wear shoes other than flip flops. Dressier than flip flops is what he meant. Well, yeah, I could do that, but then I'd probably need a new outfit to go with the shoes, since all my clothes are flip-floppable.

How come I'm an adult and I still wear the footware of a child? Shouldn't I own at least one really nice outfit? If I had the outfit, what would I wear over it if I was cold, because I doubt he'd like me using my blue hoodie either, In fact that would probably be a more serious infraction.

Okay, the whole thing makes me laugh, but it also worries me because it makes me think that he must have a whole closet full of big boy clothes and maybe I'm not grown up enough for a man who wears big boy clothes. It should not be too much for a man to expect his lady to be able to put on something nice every once in awhile. I think I need to do some shopping because I want him to be proud of me and I want to feel proud of myself, as well.

So many times I feel like I'm younger on the inside than I appear on the outside. I worry that I'm a fraud, that everyone can see my doubts, like they are fully visible and listed by order of fraudliness down the side of my face. Number one would be "still fairly clueless about raising teenagers," because that's a particular challenge I've struggled with today. Number two might be.... "worried she's bit off more than she can chew in regards to this damn marathon situation."

No. Wait. I reject that one. I'm not a fraud in the case of that one. I fully expect to be overwhelmed by marathon training, I'm guessing that there will be a lot of tears. I'm going for it anyway, because no matter what doubts I feel, no matter how many times I have to talk myself off that you-suck cliff-side, I know that I'm fine. I know that I'm attractive in my own way, and I know that I can run 26.2 miles with 5 months to train. I know it.

3 comments:

Driftwood and Pumpkin said...

I could have written this post! My clothes are all flip floppable. I really would love to feel grown up enough to have "real" clothes. I cried a lot during my marathon training. But I cried more of joy when I crossed the finish line on my own two feet!

Oh, and BTW, you have a gorgeous smile. Totally jealous!

Anonymous said...

Oh boy..that is a great analogy as the 'you suck cliff'..been there often myself. I think that acceptance gets easier with age as I am done with the nitty-gritty parenting and my kid likes me again. (lol) and so I don't have doubts about that anymore. I don't have an aspirations of being a cougar so I wear what I want. Now if I had to deal with a boyfriend, I don't know what I would do. Does he want you to wear nice clothes so you can go to a nice dinner? Otherwise he should respect you for who you are I think...But heck, I haven't dated in over 25 years....

Askew To You said...

Thank you, Tracey! I'm smiling right now, after reading your comment. I did get some really cute shoes today. And I can walk in them. WooHoo. (but I will always love my flip flops.)

Michelle, I think he wants to take me some place. I'd like that. I'm a bit on the hippie side and I've made sure that he understands that. I would like to get dressed up and go somewhere nice, have good meal. My new shoes are so comfy that I think I could even dance in them. :) One of my favorite memories of him is watching him dance with my sister about ... 22-23 years ago. He can't remember doing it, but I remember clearly, he called "Robin," she ran over and they did this little thing. It was cute.

Okay, sorry, was distracted with boy thoughts there for a minute.