Morning guys, just got back from me run, its 6.30am and I feel great. So if you have woken up this morning feeling a little crap reading this, so “Im sorry to hear your feeling crap“, (please feel free to stop reading now) but do you know what? I am not apologising for being in a good place.
Now you might be thinking ‘what the fuck is she on about I wore a dress?’ well, every Tuesday and Thursday theres a stall on the bottom of the Moor, in Sheffield, its run by two GREAT women, who have clubbed some cash together to start their own little business. They are there bless em, come rain or shine and cold (and let me tell ya they have braved some shit weather) I love their clothes, they aren’t the usual standard high street clothes, they sell pretty much unique one offs, a style I used to love to wear many years ago, when I had the self confidence to wear something different!
This Tuesday, I popped I to see if they had anything new in or if they had got he dungarees that I’d bought a few weeks earlier, but in black (I’d asked them to get me some if they saw any). Anyway, they pointed out their new stock and said “we’ve got a dress I think you will love“ I’m like “Nahhhh, ya know I don’t wear dresses!“ but they showed me the dress and I did like it, in fact I loved it, but I don’t wear dresses! (apart from when Im on me holidays because no body knows me there, I might wear a long dress at home, but only as long as it comes to me ankles, but thats as far as it goes)
Your probably wondering ‘why doesn’t she wear dresses, the weirdo?’ its because I hate my calfs! yes, you heard right! I hate my calfs, they are like footballers calfs, not ya slim feminine calfs, mine are “massive“ – well the girls on the stall convinced me to try the dress on over me clothes, I reasoned that it if covered my calfs, it might be a goer. And it did, “just“ cover me calfs, and I did like it, I was presenting at a conference the day after and thought that it would probably look better (more presentable) than the torn jeans and baggy top I was planning to wear. So I bought it, but did say, “look if im not sure im bringing it back Thursday ya know“ so it still wasn’t a done deal that I would wear it the following day, I still needed to see it properly myself.
I got back to work, and beckoned me mate Helen to the small office (she was probably wondering what the fuck I wanted) I was like I’ve bought a dress!, I’m actually laughing to myself writing this “its official I am a weirdo“ I tried the dress on again, over my clothes, again and asked her what she thought? of course she said “its nice, it looks nice“ little reassured, but also feeling a little bit of a tit of me sen, , I took the dress off and said “i’m still not sure, i’m going to try it on again when I get home”
I got home, the very first thing I did was try the bleeding dress on. it looked ok, it was different, I took it off, feeling a little more confident. So, when Pat got home, I was like “right I need you upstairs“ Poor sod thought it was his lucky day!“ Instead, I stripped off, put me dress on and said “what dya think“ he obviously said it looked ok, so I took it off for the third “fucking time“ and decided, yes, I’m going to bite the bullet and wear it the following day.
I reasoned with myself that even though I might feel out of my comfort zone, wearing a dress to the conference, nobody at the conference would notice, because the majority of them
a) Don’t know me and realise that I am a weirdo
b) Don’t care that I’m wearing a dress, they want to know what I’m there to talk about
Morning of the conference I went for me morning run, got back, showered and dressed, and thought “right this is it, I look ok, lets do this”. My colleague Charlotte was picking me up, she pulled up, got out of the car and the first thing she said was “Morning, you look nice” (god little did she know), now I feel comfortable telling Charlotte, so I was like ” You do realise that this is the first time I have worn a dress in years!” I had to have a word wi me sen, this might be a BIG deal for me, but no fucker cares if im wearing a dress or not!
It’s fair to say, my first outing wearing a dress, that did in fact, show some of my calfs, (I’d noticed when I was carting me rucksack on me back, but every-time I thought about it, I tried to let it go). The conference went GREAT, our presentation went down well, a lot of people in the audience asked questions, and a few stayed behind after to ask more questions, which is a good sign. Whats not so good is when theres NO questions and a room full of people running out for lunch as soon as you’ve finished your presentation.
So presentation done and apart from not being able to sit with me legs open, like I would have been about to do wearing trousers and trying to remind me sen to cross me legs, AND dealing with more than usual sweaty legs, Christ how do women do this? my first attempt at wearing a dress that showed a little of my calfs went ok.
Now you might think I’m weird and I would agree, I am also openly admitting to being someone who can and does quite frequently ‘over think’ I frequently ‘question myself’ and ‘doubt myself‘. And if were all really honest with ourselves “we all do” and guess what? its OK.
I read a GREAT book a while ago, in fact, after telling a few friends about it, Ive bought them a copy and I would encourage you to do so too, its called the “The Chimp Paradox”
Basically we all have a chimp, you cannot get rid of the chimp, but you CAN TAME it, by learning to understand it, and learn to understand which chimp is chatting shit in your head. For me, from buying that fucking dress, my “insecure” chimp, would not shut the fuck up! but because I reasoned and didn’t listen to the chimp, I wore the dress, ‘no one died’, it felt ok, ‘well it did feel a little weird, but it was ok’
Disclaimer: The picture of me wasn’t taken to make a point about wearing a dress, I’d promised the girls on the stall that I’d get a picture and let them use it on their facebook page to help them sell some more. (they had better give me a discount next time on there, which will be today, by the way, I’m hoping me dungarees which pat says ‘make me look like Handy Pandy’ might be in.
Soooo who’d have thought? to anyone looking at the pic, how would they know that it had caused me so much wasted worry and grief? ‘after all, its a fucking dress for crying out loud’ so next time you see someone and think to yourself ‘look at them, they are always happy or I wish I had her confidence’ remember alls not what it seems
Reet I’m off
Love Tracey x
The dress has been put away