Talking To Yourself

    I've written a great deal already about the way we alter ourselves when we dress our bodies and launch ourselves into the world.  Few of us indeed leave the house with literally zero concern for the impact of our apparel on others, even when our conscious mind doesn't willingly own that.
    But what happens when we are alone?
    Does Attire language cease to have function and validity when we're sitting on the sofa in our sweats re-watching Mean Girls?  Of course it doesn't stop working with and for us.  Its merely that the conversation becomes one that occurs entirely within us.

    When we leave our home the apparel decisions we make impact others, whether we like it or not, as do theirs, so the conversation is mutual.  When, however, after a long work week, you get home at last, and slip into your favorite comfy stuff, shedding the armor of your public self, you make a statement to yourself about that.  We can be saying, that we no longer wish to interact with others, that we are tired, or cranky, or overstimulated by the weeks events.  However we frame the statement in our heads, the result is the same; we are voicing a sartorial sentence to our own brains and spirits, without reference to others.  This is part of why our at home clothing tends to be loose, stretcthy, soft and well worn.

    We tend to go straight to clothing that is not only literally very comfortable, but things with ample personal history for us that is positive and nurturing in some way.  There's a real reason why so much at home gear is cotton flannel.  Its like being petted softly, and held close.  So for most of us, our chosen togs for laying about are old trusted well made things that got broken in long ago.  They might be a bit the worse for wearing, but to our minds that only endears them further and strengthens the attachment we have to them.

    Take a moment to think about it.  What things are your go tos? Where and when did you get them?  Why are they such often used words in your Attire vocabulary?

    Now, let me take a moment to talk to those of you who shed everything when you get home.  Not everyone gets out of their real world duds and puts on other clothes. Some folk prefer to be naked at home.
    Does that mean we aren't part of the discussion any longer?  Nope, sorry, we don't get to opt out.  See, even when we are buck nekkid, the Attire language is still working.  Tattooed? Have an interesting hair color? A well groomed beard? Pierced? Wearing a wedding band?  If any of this applies to us, then, even when we have thrown our clothes into a pile on the bedroom floor and stepped, blissfully from them, we're attired.  So the statement inside becomes; I get to finally jettison clothing, to separate myself from that.  But that is no less a sartorial statement than if you're bundled up to the neck in a patterned snuggie.

    Wherever we are, whatever we are doing we are still involved in this wildly complicated method of communication; even when the only person listening, is us.