I am NOT a Lilly Girl

Annie lent me this book, "Love Walked In" by Marisa De Los Santos a couple of weeks ago and I finished reading it a few days ago. There were some points in the beginning, (that really didn't have much to do with the plot) that really struck a cord with me. They put words to ideas I've always known.

"There was a clothing boutique her mother called "Instant WASP" that sold crisp, expensive clothes in candy pink, daisy-eye yellow, tree-frog green, and also sold matching mother-daughter Lilly Pulitzer dress that made Clare and her mother roll their eyes at each other and say, "I wouldn't be caught dead!" (pg. 56)

I am not a Lilly girl. I never have been. A part of me always wanted to be a Lilly girl, but it wasn't written. I've wanted to identify with some sort of group, but never have. I've always just been me.

I'll never forget the time in high school when one of the so-called "Goths" declared, "If the Preps can do it, so can we!" as I entered through the exit door of the lunchroom with my friends, Beth and Nicole. It was the first time I had been labeled. It made me laugh a lot. Me? A prep? I liked having a category despite it not accurately depicting me. Perhaps that day I had been wearing a polo shirt, but I assure you the next day it was something entirely different. I wonder what that kid thought when later that year, I dyed my hair black and had a pixie cut?!

You see, I can never stay one thing for too long. I keep trying new looks, longing to find my place in society, when all along it's been there. My fashion sense is as eclectic as my taste in music and that's okay. I don't need to fit a mold. I rather like the fact that my Vera Bradley hipster is covered with "Go green", "Hot Hot Heat", and "I'm Betting on Alice" buttons- it throws people off.

I've been searching for the "real" me for some time now (and not just with fashion). I have a BA that I haven't put to use. I've worked various jobs in the three years since my college graduation, but have yet to find my calling.

"The truth was, I was treading water and had been for some time. If you're wondering why a thirty-something woman who had gone to all the trouble of attending a university and slogging through medieval allegorical text had risen no higher on the career food chain than cafe manager, I don't blame you. I wondered myself. And the best answer I've come up with was that I hadn't figured out anything better- not yet. If I were to ever have a full-fledged vocation, as opposed to a half-assed avocation, I needed to love it and, in my experience, it isn't always easy to figure out what you love." (page 5)

Okay, so I'm only twenty-something, studied Latin American History and work in a Lilly Pulitzer boutique, but the semblance is there. I haven't figured out anything better- not yet. But I am getting there...