Do Clothes and Fashion make a Person?

Does it really matter how you dress for school or for a job? I believe that dressing for success has everything to do with comfort and being relaxed in your day to day activities. Sure, there is a time and a place for everything, depending on the title you might hold at your job, but should we be judged because of the attire we choose to slip on before we head off to our jobs each day?

This has been a topic as well as an issue for the past two years for me, both in regard to myself and my son. For me, I was involved in Mary Kay Cosmetics and the big push was to only wear a blouse, skirt and closed toed shoes!! *rollin' my eyes here* That is simply not me and to be honest, I didn't feel comfortable in that get up. OK, so the Mary Kay corporation and those in the upper echelon of the organization felt that being dressed to the hilt, all made up with Mary Kay make up only, was one of the ways of being successful in Mary Kay. Of course, now I know better and realize it was simply a case of smoke and mirrors. If you dress like a business woman, you send off the message that you are successful at selling Mary Kay. UGH!! Can I say bullshit? Yep, because after having "seen the light" I realized that it was what it was, just another way to get new recruits to believe that they wanted to sign up too. Ah, but that's another story. For the real truth on Mary Kay Cosmetics, be sure to check out Pink Truth. I'm now back to dressing for comfort and occasion, not trying to impress anyone.

Now on to my kid!! He's 14 years old and is trying to dress like he's a hip hop rap star or a city kid. Well he is definitely into the music, but don't let him fool you, he listens to all sorts of music. So anyway, we took a trip before Christmas and after getting settled into our Miami hotel for one night, we walked across the street to a shopping mall called Bayfront. This mall was geared towards the kids in the biggest way. We're talkin' Hooters Bar. Yes, for some reason my kid is impressed with Hooters lolol -go figure-. I guess that could simply mean that he has a normal sex drive (normal=in the eyes of the general population). WHEW!!! *smile* So anyway, he found this "blingin" watch and just HAD to have it. OK, so it was Christmas time and I succumbed to the purchase, even though I knew darn well what would happen. He wore it on vacation and I haven't noticed that he's worn it since, but he just HAD to have it!! He just loved this mall, saw lots of things he thought he would like to have, but fortunately, I didn't give in to his every whim. I did end up buying him a new pair of sneakers, made in Argentina (modeled after their soccer team) while we were in Key West and he's actually been wearing those. Luckily, they didn't soak me for 100.00, but I did buy him some nice cologne. He's all about 'smellin' good' lol. We returned home from vacation on Christmas Eve and luckily, I had done a bit of Christmas shopping prior to even knowing about this last minute vacation so at least I had some Christmas presents for him. All in all, I think I did pretty good. It's so difficult to buy for kids who think they have to 'dress to impress' and keep up with those darn Jones' In the past, I have let him pick out his own Christmas clothes, but this year, I got smart *wink*. I followed a couple of "men of color" around the store in Erie and bought what they bought after having seen basically how they dress. Akademis sounded like a possible hit and Old Skool worked for me too in regard to urban wear. He really wanted some Ice Cream sneakers by Pharrell, but we never did find any his size. So that's when he settled for the shoes from Argentina. *smile*