Keanu Reeves probably has narrow feet

I have this idea of myself – the way I would look, if my outsides reflected my insides.  I’d be taller and my hair would be straight (or at least predictable) and my feet would be big enough to wear more shoes without so much of a hunt, and while I’m at it, they would be less wide and peasantish. There’s a scar or two I’d do away with, and I’d be more… lithe, more graceful. I’d never, ever fall going UP stairs.  That’s what I would look like.

Now, I’m neither silly, nor young, so I don’t believe for a minute that any of this is going to change.  I’m undoubtedly going to spend the rest of my life dancing at nipple level to my friends, hemming every pair of pants I’ll ever buy, hoping for the best with my hair, and sighing as I try on yet another pair of dress boots that are both too big, and too narrow for my dumpy wee feet.  I absolutely understand all of this – and it can’t explain what happens to me when I walk by the Habu Booth at Madrona.

They have all these samples hanging up. They look like this, and like this and like this. They are interesting, elegant shapes, and knit from paper, and silk and stainless steel, and they are so beautiful to me that no matter what my intentions were – no matter how firm my resolve to stomp straight past that booth this time, I end up drawn in there, standing below the samples, running silk through my hands, pulling the stainless steel thread into wild shapes, and imagining myself sweeping along, wearing all those lovely things paired with elegant wide pants that don’t make me look squat, or a long sophisticated skirt that I don’t own, together with wonderful shoes that would never fit my feet. It takes what’s really a surprisingly long time for me to remember than that I’m actually the woman from the first paragraph, realize I’m thinking that these sweaters will make me someone I have no hope of ever being (namely tall) and eventually I buy more stainless (or paper, or silk) for yet another scarf, and sadly moon off to the button booth where I buy enough pewter clasps for imaginary sweaters to make myself feel better.  (I have lots now.)

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This time though, one of the samples was Sea Tangles.  Do you see how it looks? It’s… elegantly ratty. It fits right in with that way that I think I’d like to be – that New York artsy, post-apolcalyptic, I was almost cast in the Matrix, kind of look. Better than that, it’s sheer – I’d wear it over other clothes, clothes I own already, and I wouldn’t need to be tall – or even tall-ish, I don’t think.  If I made that, I thought…

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I’d never fall up the stairs.  I’ve started. I can’t wait to find out if you can wear a stainless steel and wool sweater through security at the airport.

(PS. I also got the paper and silk/steel for some scarves. I am weak.)