https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/topic/memories-or-how-i-forgot-to-put-my-best-shod-foot-forward Style Advice for Fashion Lovers en-US Wed, 29 Apr 2026 02:38:42 +0000 http://bbpress.org/?v=1.0.2 q https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/search.php https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/topic/memories-or-how-i-forgot-to-put-my-best-shod-foot-forward#post-989271 Wed, 24 Jul 2013 16:58:38 +0000 Mary Beth (formerly LBD) 989271@https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/ <p>Moni, I just found this post.&nbsp; &nbsp; Your words are so profound, I can't even weep.&nbsp; I can only sit here and just be in awe.&nbsp; &nbsp; Thank you for sharing your story!</p> <p>And Hil, and Ornella, and Elpgal, and everyone here, thank you for your uplifting insights!</p> <p>I found a website eight years ago that really, truly changed my life.&nbsp; &nbsp; <a href="http://www.flylady.net" rel="nofollow">http://www.flylady.net</a>&nbsp; &nbsp; It is a free site (although there is an online shop, and the cleaning tools I've purchased are fantastic).&nbsp;&nbsp; And she has a wonderful message about not saving 'for good', but knowing that you are good enough and deserving to use/wear your lovely things.</p> </p> https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/topic/memories-or-how-i-forgot-to-put-my-best-shod-foot-forward#post-987994 Tue, 23 Jul 2013 01:58:09 +0000 abc 987994@https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/ <p>Thank you for a beautiful piece of writing and a powerful message. &nbsp; </p> https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/topic/memories-or-how-i-forgot-to-put-my-best-shod-foot-forward#post-987351 Mon, 22 Jul 2013 06:26:08 +0000 Sylvie 987351@https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/ <p>Manidipa, I wanted to respond to this earlier and say how glad I am that you've learned this lesson for yourself - not to save your best stuff for someday.&nbsp; Also, I really enjoyed how you told your story - you paint a very vivid picture!</p> <p>The only bad closet habit my mom passed down to me is unnecessary frugality and I've obviously gotten past that!&nbsp; I remember being on the parental dime and liking a $30 top, but having to buy the $20 top that wasn't actually my size but fit ok.&nbsp;&nbsp; Her attitude is that for the prices, she'd rather buy 5 tops that are 6-7's instead of 3 tops that are 10's. </p> https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/topic/memories-or-how-i-forgot-to-put-my-best-shod-foot-forward#post-986804 Sun, 21 Jul 2013 16:07:21 +0000 Angie 986804@https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/ <p>Heart felt, a little sad, and very powerful. Thanks for sharing, Manidipa or should I call you Moni! Pretty name </p> https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/topic/memories-or-how-i-forgot-to-put-my-best-shod-foot-forward#post-986604 Sun, 21 Jul 2013 04:39:22 +0000 ManidipaM 986604@https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/ <p>Adelfa, indeed! I remember many an Indian child being stripped down to her slip or his shorts, or even starkers if they were quite young, to eat mangoes and jackfruit!</p> <p>Missvee, yes, the older generation had good reason to make it last and last, didn't they? Even when times weren't hard, availability and budgets and sheer wardrobe space would have been lower, too, I should imagine? How many clothes shops would an average town's high street in Europe have had even half a century ago, I wonder? Certainly, here it used to be all of 1 or 2, maybe 3 or 4 in an affluent town not very long ago. Cities, yes, had more choice; but even so, people had enough ties to the countryside to still be cautious with their outlay. Even in my childhood, most affluent city people too had most of their wardrobe by way of the annual (or twice, thrice a year) gifts rather than their own buys for themselves! <br />But then, the interesting thing---when I think of older generations here or say the Pioneers in the US, and doubtless this is true of many other countries in many other times---is that they often would *not* be in a position to 'save' a wedding dress for eternity for precisely this reason! It would either have to be simple enough to be a 'good dress' to attend other people's weddings in or go to the church/temple in, or it would get made into Christening gowns or children's clothes generally. No outfit could afford to be entirely 'idle', unlike the many orphans in modern closets. </p> https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/topic/memories-or-how-i-forgot-to-put-my-best-shod-foot-forward#post-986321 Sat, 20 Jul 2013 22:13:56 +0000 Adelfa 986321@https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/ <p>Manidipa, your stories remind me of when I was a little girl in Latin America. Tropical fruits abounded and I loved them. However &nbsp;my sister and I were seldom allowed to eat them because of the terrible stains we were told&nbsp;they would leave on our clothing. We couldn't afford to let a stain ruin a dress. </p> https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/topic/memories-or-how-i-forgot-to-put-my-best-shod-foot-forward#post-986312 Sat, 20 Jul 2013 22:01:41 +0000 missvee 986312@https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/ <p>Such an interesting post. I remember my mother's scorn when a neighbour wore her new light coloured wool coat to walk her kids to school. My mother's comment was " that coat will never last!". So I learned at an early age that good clothes should be saved for " good". Thankfully I began to sew my own clothes in high school and from then on I wore whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted. But in my mom's defence, times were hard when she grew up, and nice things had to last a long, long time. </p> https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/topic/memories-or-how-i-forgot-to-put-my-best-shod-foot-forward#post-985775 Sat, 20 Jul 2013 04:38:21 +0000 ManidipaM 985775@https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/ <p>Elpgal, awesome story! Makes my heart sing.</p> <p>Beth Ann, those are very wise words about cultures and nations.</p> <p>Rachy, wish you a form-free existence! The Big Boss rings big bells here. And in a culture that is notoriously noisy, they ring LOUD!<br /> I'm also very glad for you that you are in a country where a 'paperless office' is at least possible to aim for. Mine demands written applications for forms to be filled up in triplicate, then attested and notarised. For the most basic things. Gas. Water. Electricity. Phone connection. renting a house. Using the local public pool. passports require trips to the police station begging them to come home... bureaucracy has evolved here till it is a life form! Eh well.</p> <p>CC, I would drink to that if I were not nursing the baby.</p> <p>Suz, I promise I will try my darnedest not to, despite my own tendencies! Thank you.</p> <p>Ornella, so touched. The commonality among cultures that keep wanting to 'see' women disappear or alternatively be branded 'no longer useful' is shocking. </p> https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/topic/memories-or-how-i-forgot-to-put-my-best-shod-foot-forward#post-985622 Sat, 20 Jul 2013 01:20:16 +0000 elpgal 985622@https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/ <p>My mother collects shawls and years ago when I left to come to the US, she gave me a beautiful embroidered Kashmiri wool shawl because 'it is so cold over there'. A couple of times a year, I would take it out of its cloth sack and pet it but never wore it out because it was too fancy for me and it had it to be dry-cleaned. The usual litany of excuses. My mother came to visit me when my son was born. While rearranging my closet (one is several projects she undertook while I wandered around in a post-natal (fugue), she found the shawl and figured I had never used it. She promptly repurposed it as a stroller cover the next time she took my son out for a walk. Every time, I took my son for a walk this past winter, it made my heart sing to see my mother's shawl covering my wee baby. We misplaced it on a trip to the zoo but I don't regret it one bit! </p> https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/topic/memories-or-how-i-forgot-to-put-my-best-shod-foot-forward#post-985526 Fri, 19 Jul 2013 23:47:11 +0000 Classically Casual 985526@https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/ <p>Not clothing related, but a decade or so ago there was a married couple at the WSJ, who eventually began writing a weekly wine column together. And that led to them proposing an annual "open that special bottle night". DH &amp; I participated in that annual celebration until we ran out of special bottles. The lesson learned has stuck with me: to try a lot harder to live in the moment, and not wait for some special time that may never arrive. </p> https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/topic/memories-or-how-i-forgot-to-put-my-best-shod-foot-forward#post-985515 Fri, 19 Jul 2013 23:33:10 +0000 rachylou 985515@https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/ <p>*Sigh.* Not fashion related - but anything requiring paperwork makes me cross-eyed. My mother thinks I could be an accountant because I'm *so good at math,* but the truth is I can't. She was so intense and driven about anything having to do with forms - taxes, financial investment, health insurance, etc. -&nbsp; that I feel pain when someone even mentions they had to fill out a form somewhere. Like to get a library card. A lot of anger and fear and ambition for her around things that frequently involve forms and so forth, and she pretty much dished it out to everybody over these matters. She herself is the Supreme Master of Red Tape, and everyone - including my father - just sort of crumbled under her heavy hand and screaming. My mom was a Big Boss, in the old fashioned model, I might add.</p> <p>I used to think I simply didn't have a head for it, was the more literary type. But it's not just that, I've realised. It's a conditioned, debilitating pain that sort of latched onto this random aspect of business - bureaucracy. Pavlov's dogs and the dinner bell sort of thing.</p> <p>Sad but funny, I tried to do Turbo Tax exactly once. I couldn't get past the second question and had a melt down. It would send me straight back to question 1.</p> <p> </p> https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/topic/memories-or-how-i-forgot-to-put-my-best-shod-foot-forward#post-985259 Fri, 19 Jul 2013 18:36:02 +0000 Beth Ann 985259@https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/ <p>Today you've learned a new lesson, Mandipa, and you are awake and aware to the messages that people and cultures can deliver to our hearts.&nbsp; Even when we love our nations and our families, we must sometimes refuse to believe what they tell us.&nbsp; We must own fully our views of self, of love and family and of God.&nbsp; They must be true and strong, and the broken ideas must be rooted out.&nbsp; This in no diminishes our love and appreciation for those closest to us.</p> <p>You knew your Grandmother was beautiful.&nbsp; How marvelous that nothing could diminish that! </p> https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/topic/memories-or-how-i-forgot-to-put-my-best-shod-foot-forward#post-985147 Fri, 19 Jul 2013 16:55:46 +0000 Suz 985147@https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/ <p>What a powerful recognition, Moni -- and what a beautiful piece of writing. I echo Ornella. I could read your stories all day.</p> <p>It is amazing how lessons like this sink into the bones. But seeing the pattern for what it is may be the first step toward change. Somehow I know that you&nbsp;will not be passing along the same message to your little one.&nbsp;</p> <p> </p> https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/topic/memories-or-how-i-forgot-to-put-my-best-shod-foot-forward#post-985040 Fri, 19 Jul 2013 15:13:21 +0000 Ornella 985040@https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/ <p>Well, I'm crying. For one,&nbsp;I could read your writing all day long (sleep baby sleep, so mummy can log on and write for us).<br />Second, it's the power of the insight.<br />Third, my mind is racing... memories!&nbsp;Mum's beautiful cobalt&nbsp;silk blouse I ruined, my grandmother's black clothes because as a widow (although at much later stage in her life than your grandmother)&nbsp;she was&nbsp;supposed to be invisible, she wanted to be invisible. At the South of Europe widows are supposed&nbsp;wear black for the rest of their lives&nbsp;and that's it. It took my aunts years to make her wear something else, like navy or brown, but only if they were&nbsp;dark enough - which is why, and I know this, I resented the whole idea of pairing navy and black for so long.</p> <p>Oh, so many things had just resurfaced.</p> <p>I'll come back to this thread. Thank you. </p> https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/topic/memories-or-how-i-forgot-to-put-my-best-shod-foot-forward#post-984811 Fri, 19 Jul 2013 11:05:21 +0000 ramya 984811@https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/ <p>Moni I guess that's something true to every household. even today when I try wearing my clothes when I come home my DH reminds me, remove your good clothes before going to kitchen you will ruin them . even denims !!!! Guess sometimes old habits die hard </p> https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/topic/memories-or-how-i-forgot-to-put-my-best-shod-foot-forward#post-984798 Fri, 19 Jul 2013 10:17:20 +0000 ManidipaM 984798@https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/ <p>Hil, it does NOT. I'm telling myself that too! (My dad used to as well---I wonder why *that* lesson hasn't stuck as well as mom's?) </p> https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/topic/memories-or-how-i-forgot-to-put-my-best-shod-foot-forward#post-984792 Fri, 19 Jul 2013 10:03:48 +0000 Hil 984792@https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/ <p>Wow Manidipa - that is a profound realisation! I guess the first thing that comes to mind for me is copycatting my mothers behaviour in wearing ill-fitting clothes because we are not skinny people and we therefore cover up a lot. I think I have gotten better but old habits die hard. And I now quite like the volume over volume look, but within reason.</p> <p>The other thing is just not treating yourself well. My mom is a plain jane, and was very focussed everyone else. Clothes, hair, all cheap and functional. I am trying to get out of the habit of feeling guilty about treating myself right. I like going to the hairdresser, wearing make-up and shopping... just because I like those things does not make me shallow or self centred, right? </p> https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/topic/memories-or-how-i-forgot-to-put-my-best-shod-foot-forward#post-984782 Fri, 19 Jul 2013 09:23:23 +0000 ManidipaM 984782@https://youlookfab.com/welookfab/ <p>Ever since getting on YLF, I have been trying to ditch the habit of saving my best 'stuff' for the special day that never seems to come. </p> <p>Yet I have rationalised the habit many times---it came from times that were hard, or because I bought for a fantasy, mess-free, no-dirt lifestyle, or because I'm just a hoarder by nature, or merely have low self-esteem...</p> <p><a href="http://youlookfab.com/welookfab/topic/my-reality-check" rel="nofollow">This post</a> triggered a memory that just informed me it was <b>learnt behaviour</b>. </p> <p>Learnt very literally at my mother's knee. The day she sent me off to some 'special day' or other at school wearing her wedding saree. And I came home, maybe about 10 or 12 years old, with a rip in the beautiful purple silver-brocaded (real deal!) silk that had been sitting in mothballs and tissue for over a dozen years. And my mother's face crumpled. She never stopped talking about her precious saree that 'I wore and ripped'--still hasn't. She never forgot, though she said she forgave. I never stopped feeling the guilt or resentment about the guilt. Even though she was the one who insisted I wear it, since it was 'just lying around, and for what?'... When my father offered to salvage the beautiful yardage by making a dress or kameez out of it, I refused. The colour of sour grapes wouldn't wash...</p> <p>And that reminded me of my grandmother, too, who defended me that day with 'she's just a child and it is just stuff'. My grandmother was widowed at 23 and never ever adorned again. Not even a hair tie for her or shoes except on the rare pilgrimage (canvas pumps even then, even in the Himalayas, for gods' sake---literally!) The plain lengths of bleached white cotton cloth that were her saree till the day she died, and the one ecru shawl she would allow her children to get her every few winters were all I ever knew her in. She was beautiful. Even so, she was beautiful. And striking. But it was never possible to forget that the point of her dress was to make sure she would be not-beautiful, not-striking. </p> <p>I learnt at my mother's knee and my grandmother's that special clothes are for special days and special people. Not everyone. Not everyday. I learnt that even the best people were not necessarily worthy of the best stuff.</p> <p>I wish I hadn't.</p> <p>I need to keep unlearning this old 'lesson'. Thanks for the reminder and the insight, La Belle Demimondaine.</p> <p>Anyone else want to have a go at tracing their bad (closet) habits in order to purge them? (Or heck, even un-closeted habits if you want...) </p>