Everyone Needs An 'I Don't Give a D*** Outfit'

I have never been what you call a fashion maven. I read the magazines and watch the shows. I hear all about how if I wear this outfit I'll suddenly be this hot woman with dozens of men swooning after me. Swooning men, generally, are so busy swooning that they won't do anything else, like housework. I have no use for swooning men, therefore, except maybe as foot rests or door stops.

I have a couple of dressy dresses that I never wear, but most of my outfits for work are just plain comfortable. I could dress up a little more, wear the shapewear to suck in my gut and make me sit up straight, but I can't do that very often. It is 4000 degrees here from April until December 23rd, and when it is hot outside, wearing extra clothing increases the likelihood that a person will keel over from heat exhaustion. (I cannot fathom how women survived here in the 1800s wearing 50 tons of petticoats and skirts and chemises and corsets and bustles; I would probably have just melted away into a puddle of sweat.)

My closet is all about comfort, and I am happy about that. I don't like to be indecisive about what I wear. I wake up and while I occasionally am indecisive about the color of my shirt, I know that I will be comfortable. That helps set the tone for the entire day. Occasionally, I wish that someone would take me shopping and pick out all my clothes for me, but that's mainly because I hate shopping for clothes.

But sometimes, I wake up, and just feel 'off'. They used to call it waking up on the wrong side of the bed, and I don't know what the heck they call it now. But there are days that I just want to stay in bed. Days when I would prefer to place orange cones around my desk to warn unsuspecting passerby. The fact that I am an adult with a job gets me out of bed and to work, but I don't have to be happy about it.

On those days, I have a uniform. I call it my "I don't give a damn" outfit. It's a loose-fitting black shirt with a loose fitting pair of pants, either black or green. It's comfortable, like old pajamas, without the teddy bear. It's an outfit that says that I don't care. It's an outfit that says 'leave me alone or else', but of course nobody does. Life goes on, even when I am in a bad mood, and I have to be professional even if nobody else is. Kids can throw tantrums, but adults throwing tantrums is frowned upon by polite society. Which sucks--I know that I could totally pwn a kid when it comes to tantrums, but it would probably be an unfair advantage.

So I let my outfit have the tantrum, which I don't think any kid out there has contemplated. I'm the only one who knows that the outfit is my tantrum, and that is enough. I may be smiling at my coworker, but if I'm wearing my "I don't give a damn" outfit, it's a safe bet that in my head I am laying on my back screaming "LALALALALALALALALALA!" It's perfectly safe, as long as I don't "accidentally" let what is going on in my head out.