This little rant began as a response to Helena’s post, which I think goes as far as one can go towards dismantling the idea of “fashion mistakes” without blowing the whole thing up. Then I realized that she didn’t ask for my pyrotechnics, so I’m copy/pasting it over here.

I understand that looking back on our “fashion mistakes” is supposed to be about forgiving ourselves. I’d like to back up a step and remove that frame entirely. Is this a fashion blog? Yes? Is my participation an indication that I’m interested in fashion now? Logically, yes. That’s what I’m doing now, at this point in my life. Why I want to look more critically at the concept of “fashion mistakes” that everyone has made in the past is that it assumes that everything is fashion, that everyone is “doing fashion” all the time and that not doing it the right way is a mistake.

I agree that letting ourselves be pressured into thinking we ought to dress a way that makes us uncomfortable is a failure of some sort, maybe a boundaries fail. But if dressing in all black or wearing red hats with your crew makes you happy, no matter what your coloring or other traits, that is not a failure of any kind. It is joining up some part of yourself to other people. That is living and exploring parts of yourself and the world that are different things than fashion.

We don’t talk about “swimming mistakes” and criticize peoples’ butterfly form or what kind of flip turn they choose to do. Some people are surfing, some are showering, some watering the lawn, and we entirely accept that these ways of interacting with water are not simply bad swimming form. I love to swim Individual Medley, and to train for it even if there is no race on my calendar, but I will not tell you that sipping your drink on the pool deck is improper backstroke. I don’t even tell the people sharing my lane with me that slogging through steady-state cardio laps is inefficient and unlikely to bring them results, because *I don’t know the results they want*. They might not be doing competitive swimming at that moment.

For myself, now, I want to present myself well in a way that others can see who I am and relate to me; that’s why I’m here on YLF. I’ve chosen at this point in my life to learn about fashion and to dress in a way that is simpatico with current trends, and I appreciate Angie sharing her deep knowledge and interaction with other people in doing this. I sure appreciate the hive mind confirming that I don’t need to spend €218 on a bikini! But looking at the khaki-heavy vibe of my work clothes for a few years in the early 2000s, I don’t see a fashion Fauxpas. I was focused on other parts of the pie (or, to stay consistent with the metaphor, I was hanging onto a tow rope, learning to pull up out of the water), not trying to do fashion and failing. I’ve since decided that isn’t a necessary part of my professional self, and have stepped away from the khaki without any regret or self-recrimination for having worn it.

Instead forgiving fashion “mistakes”, how about we accept that you can’t time your dolphin kick incorrectly if you aren’t in the water, and that even if you are in the water, you might be there to take a bath? Granted, there are some people here who have been in the fashion game their whole lives, and who recognize mistakes in what they’ve done. They’ve told me to butt out of their conversations and I generally do, for the most part. But the assumptions that we all make fashion mistakes, that we’ve all always been trying to do fashion, and that what we wore for whatever reasons is liable to our internal fashion police is unnecessarily judgmental and not an exercise I care to join in.