Goodies Digest 006

Standing out&worn out from seeing attempts of looking worn in

hiihihii goodie gang,

I, 24, of sound body and mind, need to sit in a dark room for the foreseeable future. Back-to-back weekends of festival dressing have left me sunburnt, overstimulated, and in possession of a very specific observation… not to mention moving straight into a Southern Wedding was a marathon of social skills I wouldn't trade for anything. Watching your best friend marry her best friend is a unique kind of treat, and if weddings don't make you fall in love even more, you're sick in the head. Three weekends, three dress codes, one conclusion! Let's dive in.

Standing out while standing at the altar

There is something uniquely clarifying about being handed a dress and told to show up in it. Sixteen of us, baby blue, identical from the neck down.. which is precisely where the conversation starts. Although this is only my second bridal party, I’m learning that a bridesmaid dress is not an erasure. It’s a canvas to build on. And what you bring to it is entirely up to youuuuuu.

I wore Asscher diamond studs and silver Jimmy Choo thong sequin heels, with my hair as close to natural as possible to a 500-person Texas country club wedding and I would do it again without hesitation. Not to stand out for the sake of it (although that was the intention) but because staying true to you is the essence of what I’ve witnessed in 3 back to back shoulder to shoulder social weekends. We all had different hair styles, we did our own makeup, and we were the most comfortable and confident version of ourselves while watching our dear Caroline say I Dooooooo!!!!!

The south understood this implicitly, by the way. The kindness in that room, the warmth, the consideration… it wasn’t performative the way a lot of graciousness can be. They weren’t costumed, not coordinated into oblivion. Just dressed, and well at that. With intention. Even when I needed to match with 15 other people, I wanted to include jewelry that meant something, with heels that had a whole story before the reception even started. That’s being true to YOU! tailoring it with respect to the event.

Watching your best friend marry her best friend in a room full of people? If that doesn’t make you fall a little more in love with everything, you’re sick and twisted. The couple was sickeningly, searingly, wonderfully in love, and 500 people dressed to the occasion felt like the only appropriate response.

Fest Dressed?

It’s not unusual for a festival-goer to go through extraordinary lengths to look “authentic” while abandoning everrrrrryy personal instinct they (we’ve) arrived with. Five years of venturing into Indio will do that to your eye… sharpen it to the vast difference between adapting your wardrobe to an occasion versus treating the occasion like a costume prompt (…!). One is responsive. Alive. Rises with ease. The other is theatrical. It’s left me worn out seeing attempts of being worn in. The fest-dressed people at both weekends (cc Brooke) looked like themselves, just dustier. Seemingly adapted, not invented. Not recently cast.

Weekly Saves [stalk with ease]

Word of the Week

STUDIED /ˈstədēd/ adjective

1. done with deliberate effort and intention; not natural or spontaneous.

2. carefully considered to the point of losing all instinct.

“There’s a version of getting dressed that’s so studied it stops being yours, and we have to start getting dressed without the intention of being perceived.”

Goodies of the Week

The cure for two weekends in the desert, as it turns out, is a beach day with no agenda and a dog that has absolutely no business being at the beach. I wore things I loved to places that didn’t require them, came home with sand in my rings, and felt completely like myself. Which is the whole point, isn’t it?

Song of the Week

Deserting your Armor

Festival dressing at its best is amplification… you take what’s already yours and tune it slightly for the desert. Responsive dressing that knows where it’s going without losing itself getting there. What I witnessed across two weekends in Indio was the opposite: a studied performance of being unstudied. Denim too perfectly distressed. Hats unwrapped that AM. Boots that weren’t broken in. And I say this with full self-awareness…. there is a version of me that treated Stagecoach festival like a casting call. A pink tutu has unfortunately graced the Coachella grounds on my watch. I get the impulse. I’ve lived it. No we’re not giving visuals.

There’s a version of getting dressed that’s so studied it stops being yours. Armor only works if it’s actually yours to wear. Borrowed armor just weighs you down. The most protected, most magnetic, most present people in that crowd were the ones who’d stopped auditioning. Who’d shown up in their own clothes, in every sense. And you could tell. You can always tell cmonnnn nowwwww.

Goodies goes Cinematic

She’s here. YOUTUBE! if you’ve been a Goodie Girl on Substack and haven’t found me there yet, here’s your invitation. Come see the rest of the universe. Loads of extra resources.

Haiku4U

Too much tequila

Favorite people in one place

Postmates, all time high.

LURVEU
HAVE A GREAT WEEKEND AHEAD
xHads