Blue Monday

I don't have time in the mornings to take outfit photos, so they are always taken as soon as I come home. I'm usually tired and sweaty and cranky. I look at these photos and all I and summon to feel about this outfit is: Well. I am clothed. So that's good. Also I think my legs look thinner than they appear to me in my mind, which is a neutral statement, not good or bad, just an interesting thing about viewing photographs of yourself and comparing them with your mental image of yourself. I didn't intend to wear teggings with this outfit, but when I got dressed, the dress was shorter than I anticipated, and you could see the cotton bike shorts I usually wear under dresses to prevent chafing. Not a cute look. So teggings it was. This dress is not that comfortable. It's tighter than I'm comfortable with, and I definitely have some VBO showing, but looking at the photos, I don't look as bad as I thought I did. 

I'm making that face because my cat was doing something funny at that moment.

Dress: LucieLu

Camisole: Lane Bryant

Teggings: Re/Dress

Necklace: Gift, but from Etsy

Black and white polka dots are one of my favorite patterns. I probably have (at least) a dozen articles of clothing in this pattern with a variety of dot sizes. I was glad I was wearing teggings, too because they are so damn comfortable. I wanted to wear cuter shoes, but I still have a nasty blister on my toe I'm letting heal, and these are orthopedic flip flops.

Today was a tough teaching day, because we read an essay on abortion, talked about immigration (and some of my white students said some really racist things that, understandably, offended my Latina/o students. It was a difficult day as a teacher, and I wished I'd been wearing something more professorial, but right now, with 23 days until my PhD exams and the heat rendering most of my clothes obsolete, I feel happy when I make it to class in anything other than my pajamas.

I don't know if you've heard about the high school shooting in Maryland today (on their first day of school), but as a teacher, it's always so terrifying to hear about. Especially when I teach a class on controversial topics, I do fear becoming a target, though I of course try to show compassion to all my students. Part of my goal in my classes like this is to help students learn how to discuss emotional, controversial topics in a calm and respectful manner. Not that school shootings necessarily have anything to do with a teacher or classmate's political opinions, I just get uncomfortable sometimes. I think it's hard to be in a classroom on a day like today.

Maybe that sounds melodramatic, but it feels emotional to me.

What did you wear today?