Isaac Mizrahi: "Color is like food for the spirit--plus it's not addictive or fattening."

A couple of weeks ago I was hanging up freshly-washed damp things to dry as wrinklelessly as they might. My hanging place is the top of an antique chest on chest. It's six-and-a-half-feet tall and has a big wide crown molding. It's a perfect place for clotheshangers, with room below for the items of clothing to be surrounded by air currents. One of the things I hung up was a magenta peachskin jacket. 

I keep folded things in the drawers of that chest. I opened a drawer to put away something and saw a scarf that I had forgotten I owned. It coordinated perfectly with the jacket. I draped the scarf over the shoulder of the jacket to remind myself to wear them together during that workweek. 

The workweek that followed included the Tuesday afternoon on which I protected the porch floor from a nasty dent by bouncing a log of firewood off my toe. In the following days, I wasn't much inclined to dress myself colorfully. Accessorizing was beyond the focus of my interest: simply applying body-coverings was adequate. So it wasn't until last Thursday that I got myself done up in those bright colors. Almost ready to come downstairs to leave for work, I saw an orangey-red necklace that was perfect with the scarf. 

Orangey-red with magenta? 

Well, sure, if there's a scarf between the two.

I felt stunning all day.

I am once again, and still, high on the magic of colorful accessories. 

And, have I mentioned (more than ten or twelve times) how much I love eBay?

This weekend I have eBayed my way into these beauties for $.99 apiece.

The only thing I own that I think might go with this is a blue shell. 

But who knows, once I hold it in front of the clothes in the closet, what might occur to me...

I do have a teal green silk shirt...

Oh! This! The jewel tones! The proportions of the thing!

How many ways could I wrap this around my neck . . . 

or fling it over my shoulder?

Mmmm . . . summer white slacks . . . 

any number of colorful tank tops . . . and this!

Tidy and tailored brown slacks/white shirt combo,

with this soft but tidy-and-tailored-looking scarf fluffing and flowing somewhere on my body...

Breathtaking as this one is . . . in its shimmery silvery blue, 

it pried out of me the princely sum of $4.

 

This necklace caught my eye. 

I looked at it closely. 

Looked at it again. 

"Looks like a bunch of baby's  toy blocks strung together," I thought, and passed  it. 

Then I went back and looked at it some more.

I am one of those who are called, politically correctly, "big girls." 

Dressing in classic neutral colors did nothing to make me look smaller. 

In fact, dressing conservatively made me feel as if I were trying to hide. 

And, "One thing there's no getting by–

I've been a wicked girl," said I;

"But if I can't be sorry, why,

  I might as well be glad!"

~from The Penitent by Edna St. Vincent Millay

Now that I am old I shall wear purple. And orange and blue and red and yellow. All together if I choose.

And whenever I catch a glimpse of myself mirrored in a winter-darkened window, 

I shall feel uplifted and rejuvenated.