fashionRIP: Vintage Umbrella

Saturday, May 26, 2012

Vintage Umbrella

The floral umbrella is featured in this story,

though they are both vintage and still functional

How fashion made for a better day!

A few days ago i had an appointment downtown and it was all rainy and as i was going to volunteer for a gig put on by arts activist event, i debated even going. Then again, i approved of the action and wanted to meet the team, as they are quite well known and i have posted their work on this blog...so . it was good form to show up. (Conscience rules)

Its Seattle, it rains; it's good for the flowers, rees and skin -I heard the 'good to go voices' in my head as i walked out the door. I unfurled my umbrella and suantered down the road toward the bus stop, a few blocks away. Then about mid point, the 358 bus passed me by. I was still a good block and half away from the stop. I stopped and wondered if i should change my course and hike up the street to catch the number 5, or give up - was this a sign?

Then i noticed that the bus was not moving away from the stop. Maybe the driver had seen my look of despair, maybe if i ran i could make it. I decided to try and started running towards it.

The driver stepped off the bus with his little litter bag. He walked slowly to the big trash receptacle and slowly emptied his bag. I was able to catch up and board the bus. Amazing ...bus riders know this is a rare and wonderful thing. Right, this hardly ever happens.

I thanked him. He just nodded. I don't know if my vintage umbrella caught his eye so he saw my sad face or if it was just that the trash needed emptying. All i do know is that it felt terrific.

The next scene was all about the umbrella. After i got off the bus and was crossing the street, a woman with a small dog walked by me from the other side. She pointed to my umbrella and said, "That's a beautiful umbrella, vintage?"

"Thank you, and yes it is vintage," I smiled, she smiled and the dog was just cute. .

All in all, that practical fashion accessory garnered about 5 "likes" in a 3 hour period. That is good energy sent to the cosmos and justifies the need for color, good design and social connections.

That is how fashion good is just good.

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Why it Matters

What's the matter with more and more fashion choices?

It sounds good; we love to be able to pick the perfect outfit. You wear it once or twice and then ....what was the real cost here?

Your time to shop and the money spent, not so much ....go a little deeper and consider the fiber source, the dyes and chemicals used, the health toll on the workers, the energy to run the machines, the transporting carbons...and now it just takes up closet space. But so what? It's been going on for-almost-ever and you didn't make the rules.

In fact we are told this is what a "healthy" economy looks like.

You will recycle it after all, give it to charity or your sister. This is more transportation and more release of those greenhouse gases. We are using a lot of our personal energy and the resources of this planet to make, use and dump "trash" Some rags, remnants and tawdry bits will molder for eons in landfills, as nature's microbial actions are hampered by our normalized, everyday toxic lifestyles.

This goes beyond dumps as the breakdown cycle that nourishes the life of this planet has been sorely challenged by GMO crops, fertilizers, pesticides, antimicrobials..RIGHT!!. All the "living better through chemistry" propaganda after WWI and II- AKA how to sell your "garbage," is our legacy. Well no more, not on my (our) watch, we are seeing things quite differently.

As we now carry 298 toxins in our bods that weren't there in the 1930s the toxic residues of normal are haunting us more and more. Ironic, no? Advanced is merely a word.

Go to the So Whats the Point blog in February for the numbers.

fashionRIP posts are copr at time of posting thank you

Extinctions ...So What?

Life evolves, some species survive some don't. We like to allude to Darwin's "natural selection" or Herbert Spencer's "survival of the fittest" because we are so good at reproducing and taking over this planet and justifying that side of our natures. The fact that we are wiping out the food chain by destroying habitat, fouling air and water and generally behaving like arrogant, tinkering idiots, is called business as usual. .....Well I and others are no longer buying that "sell."

We are wising up to the idea that we too, are dependent on these resources. We too, are physically an organic species and we really don't know what little extinction will be the start of the chain reaction that collapses the structure that we too, are dependent on.

Is this the price we are willing to pay for a pair of plastic shoes?

I say no, that despite the focus on the physical, we are more. We are heart and soul, mind, body, spirit. We are born of stars and we can and will leap over this world view based in old, untrue beliefs led by a science of isolation and religions of patriarchal, hierarchical constructs (your basic dominating Dad- with self reflective rights to rule). It is time to come together and heal. To transition into our fuller expectations and open the new possibilities. We are born with genius...let us help each other get to where we all can shine.