Leandra Medine's Blog, page 51
January 24, 2020
MR Field Trip: A Niche Celebrity Convention Where Autographs Still Feel Like Gold
Why does anyone collect autographs anymore? To answer: scenes from a weekend spent at Chiller Theater, a New Jersey convention awash with obscure or nearly forgotten celebrities and diehard fans.
Scene 1: The Main Lobby
Barbi Benton’s autograph is a thing of cosmic beauty. Rendered in cobalt-blue permanent marker, it is rich in the calligraphic flourishes of old Hollywood type, an object born to be framed. Bombastic capital ‘B’s double over themselves, somersaulting in a flurry of stylized swirls. The stem of a lower-case ‘t’ arches like a treble clef. An ‘e’ loops over with practiced ease, as though a dancer caught mid-pirouette. It is fortunate her signature is so impressive, because it cost me $40 dollars.
A personalized autograph.Benton is a former Playboy model, actor, and musician once signed to Hef’s Playboy Records, and like most missives from the sort-of famous, hers was both generous and vague: “To Laura, my new best friend,” the curly letters white-lied. I’d picked out a 1969 Macbook-sized Playboy cover for her to sign, stacked beside other printouts for sale. In it, a teenaged Benton was framed by a generic beachscape, lithe frame glistening with water droplets, a towel half-concealing her breasts. The woman who sat before me at a plastic expo table—wearing leopard trousers, leopard heels, and a Dynasty blowout—was framed by an orange MEET BARBI BENTON banner and a cardboard Cheerios box. To her right was singer-actor Danielle Brisbois, also signing pictures. To her left, a booth of slightly gnawed puppets and puppeteers from Hanna-Barbera’s The Banana Splits Adventure Hour.
Later that evening, one of the ageing puppeteers would pay $75 dollars to sit on Benton’s lap, and Benton, who has always known what makes a good picture, would position his nervous hands around her body: one on her waist, the other on her thigh.
Scene 2: The Corridors
I was there, inside a red-brick suburban Hilton hotel in Parsippany, New Jersey, to see Benton—alongside more than 100 other hard-to-place celebrities plucked from the annals of TV and cinema—for the 29th Chiller Theater Expo (formerly Horrorthon), a highly-charged, if desultory emblem of American cultural fandom. Less zeitgeisty than this year’s inaugural BravoCon, and sans Comic-Con’s Marvel-esque drag, the weekend-long toy, model, and film convention still manages to pull a substantial audience, all mulling excitedly around the hotel in matching orange wristbands. Chiller is loosely curated around the horror, gore, and nightmare genres, but also around anyone famous who will agree to come, even if their connection to scary stuff is scanty. (Benton, for instance, starred in only one slasher film and a poorly-received Argentine-American fantasy flick called Deathstalker.)
The notion of ‘fame’ is cloudier than ever, neither prescribed to certain occupations nor imbued with any sense of permanence.
That sense of vagueness pervaded the convention—and was the driving force that prompted me to attend. In an era when entire sub-economies are built on engaging audiences of micro-influencers, the notion of ‘fame’ is cloudier than ever, neither prescribed to certain occupations nor imbued with any sense of permanence. The thing Chiller made clear is what happens when you lose it, or at least feel it waning: You book a table someplace with a concentrated, interested audience, and cover it with signifiers from your fame’s apex—a time when it was crystallized and real.
Horror ephemera, etc.Before I arrived, I studied the talent lineup—flush with former child stars, WWF wrestlers, horror and fantasy actors—on Chiller’s deliciously timewarpy website. Most of the homepage appears slightly out of focus, as though viewed through someone else’s prescription lenses. Blotchy subpage backgrounds mimic mottled hotel carpet (a venue preview). There is a visitor counter and nine different-colored fonts, including orange and fluorescent green. An animated ad links to the home of New Jersey’s ‘Bat Man’ Joe D’Angeli, whose logo resembles Marvel’s Batman, but also a clip-art American flag flapping in non-existant wind.
An FAQ list reminds prospective guests of the rules. You can’t smoke inside The Hilton anymore! You can’t “work for the tickets”; you need to buy them like everyone else. If your band would like to play at Chiller, as bands sometimes do, you can email links to an MP3/4 or mail in a CD or cassette for consideration.
The guestlist is formatted like a high school yearbook: photo, name, informational snippet. It included horror hostess Elvira, Mistress of Dark; 90210 starlet and reality TV bust Tori Spelling; five baseballers from Field of Dreams; seven castmates from Revenge of the Nerds; and the biggest-ever cast reunion from The Warriors. Tony Cox, the elf from Bad Santa 1 & 2 was scheduled to be there, along with Geri Reischel, who appeared as Jan on The Brady Bunch Variety Hour, and is known on the convention circuit only as “Fake Jan.” Also present: the actors who played young Jenny and Forrest in Forrest Gump; Lisa Loring, formerly a pigtailed Wednesday Addams; and British twins Carey and Camilla More, who jointly assumed the role of Days of Our Lives’ Gillian Forrester, but more importantly, Tina and Terri in 80s slasher Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter. I wasn’t intimately familiar with their franchises, but for some reason, that didn’t matter. I wanted to meet them all.
Strolling beneath the hotel’s fluorescent lighting, past bootleg DVDs and an autograph authentication desk ($10 dollars to check items signed at the show), Chiller looked like a cross between a costumed school reunion (steampunk glasses, top hats, near-constant embracing) and a car-park swap meet (ameteur art, muscle-men figurines, an out-of-place booth that seemed to be run by Hells Angels New Jersey). The main activities involved parting with cash: queuing for autographs in windowless rooms, imbibing at the lobby bar, buying memorabilia and macabre obscurities. I am now the owner of a Living Dead Doll named “Sin”; a smirking, purple-lipped clay clown; and a sexploitation film poster I’m still on the fence about, bought from a man known only as “The Professor,” whom I loved immediately, and who wore an I LOVE TO HURT PEOPLE badge, referencing the 80s wrestling documentary. (Regrettably, I did not buy a DVD entitled I Spit on Your Corpse.)
Scene 3: The Bar
Things out of frame at the Chiller bar: wall-mounted TV screens streaming sports, a strong scent of stale beer, a man wearing a Cross Country Cowboys Church t-shirt, a lot of rubbish (Dorito packets, crumpled paper, abandoned lanyards and entry wristbands), and the actor Timothy Busfield running past, exclaiming that a group photo is booked for 4:30 (“Don’t forget!”).Chiller attracts diehard fans, of both old movies and convention circuits. They seemed to mostly be in their 40s or older, meaning those who’ve attended for a decade (I’ll remind you this is the 29th edition) can still be deemed newbies. I learned this from Eric, a redhead documentary-maker outfitted in a splatter suit, who carried a pair of drumsticks, but no drum, and had been coming since 2003. (Like a lot of people I spoke to, he lives in New Jersey.) “Every time I walk through the main hallway here, I see someone and say, ‘I remember you from two years ago!’ Or even six months ago!” he told me. “It’s crazy. The niftiest thing about Chiller is that everybody is almost automatically friends. You think, ‘Oh, you’re a fan of Roller Boogie and Death Zombies? You’re a fan of movies that are obscure, but also really popular? And you’re a fan of dressing kind of weird, even when it’s not Halloween? Me too.”
Eric and I convened in front of the bar, where a lot of people met between bouts of sensory overload: swapping intel about guests and reveling in nostalgia, letting it swallow them whole. (As one guy in blue jeans mock-lamented, “I have more stuff than I can sell, more movies than I can watch, more posters than I can hang—but I keep coming.”) The bar is like most bars in America, except there’s always a seat, the air-conditioning is set to freeze-blast, and a substantial portion of patrons at any one time are outfitted as the fictional gang from The Warriors (released in 1979).
You’re a fan of movies that are obscure, but also really popular? And you’re a fan of dressing kind of weird, even when it’s not Halloween? Me too.
Three of these faux Warriors—wearing leather vests scrawled on by cast-members in fat silver marker—had traveled together from the UK. After the convention, they planned to make a pilgrimage to Coney Island, retracing the steps of the filmic Warriors, on the run from rival gangs. Right now, they were drinking beers and taking photos with strangers: mini celebrities in their own right.
As a special festival flex, the bar served custom cocktails—The Chillers—advertised in a font that simulated knife slashes. There was a Trick or Treat Punch, “back by popular demand and … frighteningly delicious,” an amaretto on the rocks topped with Sam Adams Octoberfest
beer, and a creamy drink named The Forrest Gump that was “Like a box of chocolates,” a line I’d seen around the same time on the tablecloths at Bubba Gump Shrimp in Times Square.
Scene 4: The Car Park
One of several menacing clowns finding his way through the car lot during a fire drill.The weekend’s climax was a fire drill. As a shrill alarm sounded, fans and stars alike lurched outside begrudgingly (“This happened last year! We’ll be out here for hours!”), and waited together between parking spaces, trying to make the best of it. The spectacle was sublime and sobering, reminiscent of the moment all the lights flicker on at a club, and you can actually see the muddled cast you’ve been pressing up against. For a while I drank moonshine offered to me from the car trunk of three strangers in their sixties, who’d traveled cross-country to get some autographs, and were just happy to be there. Two of them were madly making out during a lot of our conversation—later revealing they’d only met the day before—and the third wheel, who wore a flapper dress, told stories about her daughter between swigs, a massive purple feather quivering in her cap.
My friend got a photo with a Sopranos star, who afterward said he’d been charging $40 dollars for photo ops inside, but the $20 dollars in her wallet would do.
All around us, over asphalt, meet-and-greets resumed—though without the tables, it was hard to discern who was actually a celebrity. My friend got a photo with a Sopranos star, who afterward said he’d been charging $40 dollars for photo ops inside, but the $20 dollars in her wallet would do. I got a (free!) photo with a guffawing Jeremy Woodworth—he played John Wayne Gacy in The Killer Clown Meets Candy Man—who scrunched up his eyes while scratching at his crusty, ruffled suit, pinned with brightly-hued badges that read WANT TO CUDDLE UP? and LEAD ME TO YOUR TAKER.
6 PHOTOS
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What is it that compels us to not only meet the semi-famous, but secure evidence of our brief interactions? I’d wondered this inside too, as WWF wrestler Greg “The Hammer” Valentine signed a topless picture for me and made polite small-talk, his table cluttered with soda cans. I’ve never liked approaching people I admire outside of an interview—on recently noticing Patti Smith beside me at a bookstore, I froze—but at Chiller I stacked up signatures like it was my job. Perhaps it was the context. Against the dated aesthetics of the Hilton Parsippany, encounters with fame were straightforward and transactional; there were venue maps and prices and a print-out schedule indicating who was willing to see you and when. The chance to engage with an object of prolonged fetish up-close, to collapse or fracture the boundary between the imagined and real, assumed refreshing banality in the convention format. If you wished to participate in a Q&A with the actress Nancy Allen, you could visit The Hydrogen Room at 2 p.m. If it was packed, you might form a teller line, just like at Citibank.
“You used to be able to videotape,” one guy told me outside, clasping a signed photo closely to his shirt. You could even film your own interviews for free at one point, he said—now Chiller charges $50 for taping privileges. He still finds a lot of beauty there, even if it costs. When you hear the real, live voices of those you’ve loved on the big screen, he says there’s a sense of being transported to an alternate reality, of tearing off an expiration date, reanimating memories. His interest began with Petticoat Junction, a CBS sitcom he’d watched growing up with his father. Following his dad’s death, he wanted to meet the actors, and add to a moment that had always felt good and true. Now, he says, working as a dump truck driver, the prospect of escapism remains compelling.
The chance to engage with an object of prolonged fetish up-close, to collapse or fracture the boundary between the imagined and real, assumed refreshing banality in the convention format.
Unlike the real fans, I hadn’t gone to Chiller with precise scenes from my own life I hoped to revisit, or a checklist of celebrities. Everybody thrilled me, looking like uncanny valley versions of their younger movie selves. I’d wanted to meet Robert Wuhl, whose program picture resembled a LinkedIn display photo, and who seemed to encapsulate the slippery, nebulous nature of notoriety: how much easier it was to orbit around than hold in your two hands, how decades later, everything you worked for could boil down to a few scant IMDB credits and a regional convention table. Wuhl played “man with lighter” in 1995 flop Dr. Jekyll and Ms. Hyde, “Mawby’s regular” in Flashdance, and, most famously, reporter Alexander Knox in Tim Burton’s Batman. I wondered if he ever rewatched them.
I never did meet Wuhl, but I kept seeing The Warriors—not the 13 cast members, who were stationed in the Cobalt Room—but their British body-doubles. The two gangs had a symbiotic relationship: each required the other to relive moments of glory. As the festivities wound down and mini-stalls shuttered up, I watched the fake-Warriors collide with their idols. They were all in the Cobalt Room, which was almost empty, packing down plastic tables together.
Photos by Poppie Van Herwerden.
The post MR Field Trip: A Niche Celebrity Convention Where Autographs Still Feel Like Gold appeared first on Man Repeller.
January 23, 2020
5 Ways to Actually Solve Your Shoe Storage Situation, According to the Experts
I share one very tiny apartment (approximately 300 sq. feet) with one human and 29 pairs of shoes.And while I’m fairly certain my shoes are not sentient beings, it often feels like they’re staging a coup to push my husband and I out of our home. Some of this feeling is purely symptomatic of my circumstances–I live in Manhattan, I love shoes, and unlike Carrie Bradshaw, I actually use my oven for food, so my storage options are limited.
Some of this feeling, however, is wholly my fault. For someone whose passion for shoes is both personal and professional, my strategies for storing and displaying mine are… not ideal. The shoes I wear most often get stored beneath the bench at our dining table that doubles as a shoe rack, but all the other pairs are stacked rather unceremoniously on the floor of my closet. At the end of every week, there’s inevitably a pile of them by the front door and, if I’m being completely honest, sometimes said pile trails out the front door and into the hallway, probably to my neighbors’ chagrin.
In the interest of starting 2020 on a note of self-improvement, but, like, self-improvement that can happen in a day, I set out to find a way to tackle my footwear problem. I interviewed a handful of organizational experts and got to work applying their wisdom to my own home. I’ve transcribed my findings below because chances are if you wear shoes, you’ll find them helpful too.
1. Wake all your shoes up, then kick some of them out.
This first step comes courtesy of Jessica Yatrofsky, founder of SjD Consulting, who is certified in the KonMari method and offers beautiful, minimal organizational services for hire. To start, Yatrofsky suggests pulling out all of your shoes and laying them out in the center of the room. In keeping with the philosophies of Marie Kondo, she suggests physically touching each pair and clapping or playing chimes to “wake them up” if they haven’t been worn in a while. (As someone who empathizes deeply with inanimate objects, I loved this idea. If you aren’t into the idea of standing alone in your room and clapping for a bunch of shoes, you’re probably okay to forgo this step).
Once all your shoes are laid out, you’ll have a clear picture of just how many pairs you own. I was surprised to find that I have 23–that seems like a lot! But Yatrofsky assured me this number still places me firmly in the “minimalist” category (even though my husband, who owns a total of six pairs of shoes, is inclined to disagree). Laying them out like this will also better equip you for the editing process, which, according to every organizational expert I spoke, is one of the most important parts of shoe tidying.
As a rule of thumb, I give myself permission to have a maximum of one “vanity pair” of shoes in my closet at a time.
For each pair that I pulled out of storage, I asked myself: Do these make me happy? Are they comfortable? Have I worn them in the past month? If you do the same and find that the answer to any of these questions is no, you can likely thank those bad boys for their service and see them out to your local donation center or consignment shop. Of course, workout shoes, snow boots, summer sandals, and occasion-specific shoes like formal heels serve as exceptions to the one-month rule, but still need a critical eye to evaluate them. Even though I pride myself on the fact that I KonMari my entire closet every season, I ended up retiring my workout shoes (which were worn out, uncomfortable, and definitely not making me happy) and letting go of a pair of shoes that were serving a purely sentimental purpose. As a rule of thumb, I give myself permission to have a maximum of one “vanity pair” of shoes in my closet at a time, i.e. shoes that pinch the sh*t out of my feet but are worth suffering through the pain for a great outfit every once in a while. Finally, I reminded myself that the fewer shoes I have, the fewer shoes there will be to clean up, which is an excellent force of motivation.
2. Assess the (non-literal) role of shoes in your life, and use that as a guide.
“If shoes are your thing, if they make you excited to get up and get dressed in the morning, use them as decor,” offers Lisa Ruff, of luxury home organizing company NEAT Method. Ruff suggests using a bookcase or open shelving in order to show off your shoe collection as part of your home. Yatrofsky has had clients convert an old dresser into a shoe display by pulling out the drawers.
The thought of moving my books out of sight in order to display my shoes made me sad, so I took that gut reaction as a sign that my shoes needed to remain in my closet. Out of necessity, the dining bench/shoe rack had to stay, but I resolved to make it an aesthetically uniform display rather than a place to shove my workout shoes before rushing out the door. I followed Yatrofsky’s instructions to create a “capsule collection” of shoes consisting of three or four pairs of shoes that I wear all the time (white Mary Janes, black Mary Janes, black loafers, black-and-white loafers… I’m nothing if not consistent) and gave them what Ruff called “prime real estate,” an area easy for me to see and reach, on the bench.
3. Pick a storage system that suits your shoes and your space.
I’m guilty of practicing an age-old philosophy known as Ye Olde Tactic of Cramming Things Back in the Closet. Often I end up stashing shoes out of my own sight and subsequently toss them out of my mind too. In order to combat this, Ruff urged me to store shoes where I can actually see them. (Time to break up the two pairs of Birkenstocks canoodling in the dark corner of my closet.)
Tidy Tova, a professional organizer who’s worked her wizardry on the homes of Harling and Gyan, advises every single one of her clients to buy a shoe rack. If you’re working with a large collection of shoes, both Tova and Ruff recommend storing them in rolling drawers under your bed. If you have a bit of space to spare in your closet, you can use clear boxes to store each pair of shoes individually. Ruff adds that multiple pairs of flat sandals or sneakers can be stored in the same bin if they’re “filed” vertically.
I find that I’m more inclined to keep my stuff neat if I like the look of whatever’s storing it.
I already store clothing under my bed, so I ordered a shoe rack for my closet. I opted to spend a bit more than I needed to on this option that matches the other white furniture in my home. I find that I’m more inclined to keep my stuff neat if I like the look of whatever’s storing it. Plus, $34.99 isn’t a terrible price to pay to treat my beloved shoes right, even if no one will really see this rack but me.
It wasn’t until I spoke with these professional organizers that I realized I often make decisions about what shoes to wear based upon what’s already visible and easy to grab near my front door. Though my new system has only been in place for a few days now, I’ve already found myself making more studied decisions about what shoes to wear and pulling out pairs that haven’t yet seen the pavement this season.
4. When in doubt, go vertical.
If you’re challenged for floor space in your home, try moving your shoes upward. Chances are you have more overhead room than you think; you might just need to use a stepstool to fetch the occasional pair of shoes. Ruff recommends storing all season-specific shoes in the same place so that you’re not left searching for your sandals if you get invited on a spontaneous beach vacation. In a slightly less glamorous twist, I’ve opted to store a hefty pair of hiking boots on the top shelf of my closet, out of the way of my everyday shoes but still in easy reach in case of a snow squall.
Yanofsky advises her clients to custom-build shelving in order to get the most out of their space, and she was kind enough to show me the shelves she built herself to store shoes in a tall, narrow area of her bedroom. The last DIY home project my husband and I attempted went egregiously wrong, plus we rent our place, so building anything was out of the question for us. However, if you live somewhere where you’re able to make big changes to your space and you’re handy (or have a little extra money to hire someone else who is), you can turn any unused nook into a bespoke area for your footwear.
Merchandising my shoes like this makes me feel both clever and classy and not at all like someone who ate loose Haribo gummies out of her purse while typing that.
To make a little more room horizontally, Tova stores shoes with one shoe pointing out and one shoe pointing in. I first glimpsed this trick in Leandra’s closet makeover here, but I never felt like I had the right place to test it out in my own home. I was wrong! Merchandising my shoes like this makes me feel both clever and classy and not at all like someone who ate loose Haribo gummies out of her purse while typing that.
5. Make shoe storage a habit (and maybe even a moment of joy).
“Unfortunately, there’s no magic solution to getting your shoes back where they belong without putting them there yourself,” says Tova. In an effort to be a little bit more, bear with me, mindful about tidying my home, I’ve been taking a minute before heading out the door each morning to make sure any shoes not on my feet are stored away. Though this is a tiny change, it feels good to not be greeted by a pile of shoes at my front door when I return home.
Ruff adds that if you live with someone else, like a roommate or a spouse, you should designate an area of shoe storage specifically for them, even if it’s just a shelf on a shoe rack. Things will generally stay cleaner if each person maintains responsibility for a manageable area.
Though I’m less than a week into this new shoe-tine (sorry, but also you’re lucky that I made it this far without saying it), it feels good to be treating my shoes well, lifting them up off the floor and freeing them from the dark confines of my closet corners. I know it might sound a bit woo-woo, but this whole process made me realize that what bothered me most about my messy shoe situation was that I felt like I wasn’t treating these possessions in a way that reflected how much I cherish them. As Yanofsky said to me: “Your shoes support you, they bring you through your day. How do you show respect to them?”
I’m pretty sure my shoes aren’t sentient, but just in case they are, I’d rather we live in harmony.
Photos by Beth Sacca.
The post 5 Ways to Actually Solve Your Shoe Storage Situation, According to the Experts appeared first on Man Repeller.
Outgrowing the Personal Essay: Can I Create a Voice Bigger Than My Trans Identity?
While my body is pummeled by the polar winds outside, the inside of my head is consumed by the flames of pitch purgatory. My editors want stories, something fresh and enticing.
Do I have anything to say about Beyoncé’s latest post? (Yes, always, but who doesn’t?) Should I delve into the psychology behind my fear of cutting my toenails? (No, I should not.) Does anyone want to read the deep revelations I had on shrooms about shark babies? (Doubtful.)
Even though I love all things fluffy, I don’t want to produce fluff. I want to write stories with meat on their bones, something to fill readers up and get caught in the teeth of their brains. Stories about vulnerability, masculinity, insecurity, healing, aging, love. Thoughts and feelings I have in spades.
But I’m blocked. Because I can’t address these topics without writing about my identity as a transgender person. And I am tired of always writing about being trans.
How I can write as a transgender person without losing sight of all my other parts?
When I first gender transitioned, I was excited and overwhelmed, thrilled and relieved, frustrated but also a whole new kind of hopeful. And I had a lot to say about it. I still do. But now, when I sit down to pitch, the idea of once again stripping my trans identity down and making it strut across the page sits heavy.
I’ve felt this before. Once, after I made a joke about being a strap-on sommelier during a comedy set, a woman approached me to tell me she thought I was going to be successful because “gender is really in right now.” As annoying as her comment was, she wasn’t totally wrong. When I first started pitching to publications two years ago, part of me most likely tapped into the game of it all and guessed that material exploring my underrepresented identity could serve as a foot in the door.
In a way, it did. And it wasn’t just me. In the 2010s, personal essays—especially those in which writers explored who they were, without shame (or sometimes about the shame itself), with complexity, in the context of history and in our current moment—became a prime dish on the lazy susan of online media. I started pitching stories right as editors started placing more value in writers inviting readers into their private ecosystems, especially if they’d been previously ignored or unexplored by the those at the helm. After an eternity of those in power whitewashing our society’s fabric and silencing the voices that carry the choir, prioritzing women, POC, indigenous, and queer people’s stories is fated and fair.
But now that my foot, leg, and maybe one butt cheek are through the door, I’ve been wondering: How I can write as a transgender person without losing sight of all my other parts?
How do I approach a piece about being fluffy without acknowledging how different it felt to move through the world as a big woman-bodied person compared to a big man? How can I write about childhood without wondering what loneliness is a kid’s existential inheritance and what sinks into their skin as a result of being kept from significant self-knowledge? How can I write about my lovers without considering why they love my body and how I have used them as both an escape and a homecoming? Can I write about my father without considering if he would hold my hand in public had I been born his son? I can’t change my anger’s accent. My sadness has secret doors.
I don’t write about being trans because “gender is really in it right now,” I write about it because I write about what I think about.
For me, it is a blessing and not a burden that I will always see through my trans goggles. I want to write about everything through that layered lens, but can I write about them without writing about the lens itself? I want my identity to enrich my work, not always serve as the topic of my work. Writing everything about being trans is different than writing about everything while being trans.
But sometimes it can be hard to distinguish between the two. Those who have been ‘othered’ are by definition placed in contrast to the world around them, reminded of their identities in ways that white, straight, cis-people are not. Beyond simply endeavoring to understand myself, I am forced every day to consider my place in the context of a world that, for the most part, does not consider me at all. I don’t write about being trans because “gender is really in it right now,” I write about it because I write about what I think about. But I want to write about what I imagine and what I wish for, too. And after publishing several essays on the topic of my experience as a trans person, I started to miss the kind of writing that took me somewhere new. The kind that feels like building a home I can invite others into, a table I set and a meal I prepare, serving whatever moves me. When I am at home in my writing, I get to be all my different selves.
I’m walking a dangerous line, though.
I can believe in and work toward a world in which it’s not an aberration to be trans, an indictment to be a POC, or a peril to be both—but writing as if we’re already there would be harmful. And writing as if my identity as a trans person isn’t relevant to every pane of my worldview would simply be untruthful. I need to write about who I am. It is important for me, for other trans people, for people who don’t understand us, for people who hate us. It is also true that I need to be heard in other ways.
As we collectively pry open the doors of the ancient fortress, identity matters. We are making declarations: History is not a prison, each person is their own master key, there are debts to be paid, and there is room for everyone. If I commit myself to that vision, then I must also commit to a vision in which there is room within my writing for all my parts. Including the part of me that is tired of explaining and expounding upon my transgender identity.
You do not need to give yourself a testosterone shot every two weeks to feel the vulnerability of needing help to become whole.
Sharing any art publicly requires a strong belief in your individuality and a sense of trust that your specific humanness will remind everyone else of their own. But my kind of humanness is so particular, sometimes I wonder how others connect to it. Or worry that I’m simply trotting out my inner world for others to look at from an unfeeling distance. Then I remember that writing is magical. How else could a writer hold the mirror up to themselves and show the reader their own face?
You do not need to give yourself a testosterone shot every two weeks to feel the vulnerability of needing help to become whole. You do not need to be transgender to understand how harmful it is when someone tells you who you are or who you should be. Part of “normalizing” trans existence means I do not have to constantly write about those parts of myself—but it also means that those parts are always there, informing how I think, feel, and communicate. I can be a special guy and just a guy, a trans writer and just a writer, at the same time.
I want to exist in the world that is and the world that can be. Which is what being trans can feel like, what being an artist can mean. We are bridges between those two worlds. I want to write about Beyoncé, shrooms, and phobias. I want to write about language, loneliness, and loss. I want to write about my strap-on, my scars, and my search for some kind of calm. And I want to write them all as my full self.
I want to be a magic mirror.
Graphic by Lorenza Centi.
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Express Lane Style Tips: How to Crop Your Jeans Without Losing the Hem
Welcome to Express Lane Style Tips, the quick and easy way to make clothes you already own and love feel like they just drank three shots of espresso.
When I was a kid and my mom bought me pants that were too long on me, she would always sew them inwards until I grew tall enough to wear them at their full length. At that point, she’d pull the thread out like a sort of victory dance, congratulating the bones in my legs for expanding vertically. I hated how they looked (the jeans, not my bones) when they were sewn in–unfinished like a wood table that had not yet been sanded. This is a weird metaphor, I don’t know why it came to me, but recently I’ve been thinking that no pants are worse served by a hacking or hemming or inward-cuffing job that loses the hem of your jeans. That’s like, the best part of jeans. Particularly when they’re of the vintage variety, or at very least treated as if non-stretch Japanese denim, creating this wash that looks like a teeny tiny barcode flirting with the floor, or your ankles, depending on your height.
And to this point, a lot of you have asked what the right length of pants for shoes should be. It’s a subjective question, answer contingent on height and quality of pants to be sure, but I’d say there’s a sweet spot between the front bone of your foot and the top of your ankle where most shoes are served comfortably. Sometimes, though, you want them shorter or longer, which is why a formal hack job doesn’t always make sense. Cuffing them inward from the bottom up eliminates the hem (particularly of jeans, which for the purpose of this post, we’ll use as the synonym for pants) and hacking them completely is just so… permanent. What if you change your mind and want them longer a year from now, a month from now, tomorrow? And so I present the best revocable hack for cropping your jeans without losing the hem.
Now let me break this down step by step for you, because what you see happening is simple but there is a science behind it.
As a Step 1, you’re being asked to pick a spot along your shin where you’d like to start your crop. To be clear, this is not where your jeans will crop until, but it is the point at which you will create a cuff either thick or thin enough to meet the hem of your jeans. (This, btw, is the other reason this trick is so great, you can trial and error until the cows come home, or your finger tips fall off!)
As a Step 2, you start folding in. Just imagine you’re cropping inward from the bottom, but with the added baggage of the actual bottom remaining in tact. You know?
As a Step 3, you’re going to want to line up the cuff with the hem. Imagine the cuff pressed like a freshly dry cleaned shirt and use that grand vision to fold it in. Now grab at the actual hem, smoothing it out from the inside circumference of the bottom of the pants. My photos don’t present the perfect version of this solution, but I’m pretty impatient, therefore kind of messy, and generally prefer an IMPERFECTION but you can do this as neatly, or not neatly, as you want.
Step 4: Repeat and modify depending on the heel height and style of shoes you’re wearing.
It’s not a perfect solution, but it’s one that works. Try it! Tell me how it goes! Or don’t. That’s fine too. But please, I beg, drop more express lane style tip-tips below.
Photos by Beth Sacca.
The post Express Lane Style Tips: How to Crop Your Jeans Without Losing the Hem appeared first on Man Repeller.
January 22, 2020
Whose Shopping Recommendations Do You Actually Trust?
First, I scoured The Strategist, my usual starting point, for the site’s top recommendations: Its editors vouched for the Sony WH1000xM3 model above all, endorsing the Bose QuietComfort 35 II as a close second, while Wirecutter ranked the Bose Noise Cancelling Headphones 700 best. I also asked my brother, a person with more knowledge of the headphone space than I have and with taste and standards I trust, for his recommendation. He’d recently opted for the Sennheiser PXC 550 Wireless and thought I couldn’t go wrong with those. And then I almost succumbed to the influence of Succession—for reasons I’m not sure I can or should articulate, I coveted those Beyerdynamic headphones Kendall Roy wears in the season two finale and felt seduced by the idea that I could recreate the look of Kendall on the brink of implosion with my pair of Article One sunglasses, a close-enough dupe. Ultimately this was not a justifiable reason to buy a certain style of headphones. After a night spent hunched over my laptop comparing Amazon reviews, I let my brother’s referral—the most personal recommendation I’d procured—tip the scale.
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This probably sounds like an incredibly average Tuesday night spent online shopping in the year 2020, but I wasn’t always like this. I’m not the first person to grapple with this methodical way of making a purchase, on the internet or on Man Repeller, but it’s something I turn over in my mind all the time. There was once a time when I (happily) did not do things efficiently. But at some point, I got hooked on the satisfaction of making decisions with a laser-focus, striking items off my to-do list in rapid-fire succession. It has permeated nearly every facet of my life, including the way I shop, and even the way I literally move through the world—I’m convinced I walk 50% faster than I used to.
I discovered my personal peak of internet-product-recommendations when I skimmed the weekly “Garden Variety” newsletter last April and saw that the editors had hyped up the Unicorn Pepper Mill, a utility of Bon Appetit test kitchen fame. As a person who had never thought twice about a pepper mill, the newsletter’s testimonial gripped me: “The Unicorn is so smooth I actually gasped the first time I turned it,” Emily Hindman wrote. “It’s easy to use, looks sleek on your counter, and produces a remarkable consistent grind. It also, ingeniously, comes with a little saucer to sit on so pepper doesn’t get all over your counter. In the words of the best Amazon review of this product, “Welcome to the big leagues, pepperpeople.” Of course, what goes up must go down: After reading through the first fifty entries of The Strategist’s definitive notebook rankings, I realized I had to go to a local paper goods store to hold all the prospective options in my hands and decide for myself.
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As a natural extension of this robot logic, I’ve developed a sense as a shopper that not only should everything I buy be the absolute best, it should be more than one thing, too. And so began the hunt for next-level life hacks (or shortcuts, as we used to call them). It felt like cracking a code when I read Recomendo and learned I could use a Nespresso Aeroccino milk frother I already had to brew a makeshift matcha latte with the press of one button.
With all the products we buy, from ribbed turtlenecks and walking shoes to composition notebooks and pepper mills, it seems we crave to make fewer, better choices over luxuriating in immense optionality, as our minds begin to feel oversaturated with information overload. This easily explains the appetite for sites like New York Magazine’s The Strategist and The New York Times’ Wirecutter, which promise to optimize your consumerist quests, and find that one perfect item that assuages your need, rather than pushing a product that only meets you halfway. Getting the most bang for your buck is not a new impulse, but on a product-recommendation-obsessed internet it seems like it’s taken on a life of its own.
So while I think I was originally drawn to The Strategist for its widespread appeal—it is like a sexier, millennial-focused, if-less-scientific Consumer Reports, after all—the thing that’s kept me coming back to their URL are the niche finds I never knew I even needed an expert recommendation for, like illustrator Leanne Shapton’s favorite kind of pen for signing prints, for example.
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The same level of personal recommendation inspired me to buy something on Man Repeller recently, too. I’ve been looking for the perfect black pants (matte black, straight-leg denim that’s neither too raw or too stretchy, with gold hardware) because finding them would streamline my routine, and I could redistribute that focus elsewhere, to something more worthy of my attention. The day I wrote that as part of the draft for this story, I checked the Man Repeller site and saw that Harling (who is to pants what Shapton is to pens, in my book) had discovered the perfect pair. The next week, I beelined to AYR, tried them on, and bought them.
When I started to investigate the way I think about shopping and the way the people around me approach buying stuff, it worked up a lather of questions. Like: If cold algorithmic rankings aren’t quite enough to move me and the old guard of tastemakers—editors or, more broadly, magazines—are becoming less relevant, which method of shopping will ultimately prevail? (As for a replacement for editors, I’m not convinced that the Instagram influencer is the long-term answer, or the most satisfying one. I don’t often buy something an influencer recommends, but my cart does suddenly bulk up when a colorful newsletter by Bon Appetit editor-at-large Christine Muhlke hits my inbox.)
I also wonder what kinds of cultural events could move the needle. Will it be (a desperately needed) wave of climate consciousness that redirects our energy from shopping to something else altogether? And then there’s the question of optimization and if it’s actually good for us. (I imagine the answer to this question is a boring one you’ve heard before: everything in moderation.) Maybe the idea that there is one “perfect item” out there in any given category is a delusional ideal. And what’s it all—the smoothest pen, the sleekest pants, the most finely ground black pepper—in service of, anyway?
Photos via Everett Collection and HBO.
The post Whose Shopping Recommendations Do You Actually Trust? appeared first on Man Repeller.
I Reinterpreted 5 Miu Miu Looks With My Own Wardrobe
On road trips, my family likes to play a game where we debate which outfit we would wear if we could only wear one for the rest of our lives. It’s an exercise that instantly reveals the essence of someone’s character–will they favor practicality or style? Something colorful or muted? Are they, for the love of a good sweater, concerned about getting cold?! At times, it’s an exercise that mystifies as well. My dad recently announced with pride over Sunday dinner that he had finally settled on his perfect formula: snow pants and no shirt.
I’ve always struggled to answer the (admittedly inconsequential) “one and only outfit” question myself. The thought of wearing the same outfit day after day, to the gym, in the blazing heat, to a job interview… sounds terrible. However, when we recently tweaked the question to ask which brand we would wear if we could only wear one forever, I was quick to answer: Miu Miu. I’ve waxed poetic about my love for Miuccia Prada before, but as uncertain as I am that I will someday grow into a Prada woman, I’m doubly certain that I am a Miu Miu woman at this very moment in time.
It’s not just that Miu Miu, Prada’s fun-loving little sister line, is chock-full of everything I like, with an abundance of bows, crystals, pearls, and precious prints. It’s also that the brand maintains a steadfast dedication to creating clothing for a woman who is polished but still emotionally youthful–and who absolutely does not take herself too seriously. She’s buttoned-up, but she has naked ladies on her collar. She’s got fuzzy socks tucked into her heels! In short, Miu Miu is the antidote to January style doldrums, so I set out to create five (please, I need a test run before I commit to forever) Miu Miu looks from the contents of my own closet.
#1: Overalls Over All, S/S 2020
When I glimpsed this outfit in photos from the Miu Miu show this past fall, I knew it would be only a matter of time until I copied it myself. White overalls with a white blouse is one of my long-standing favorite outfits–I can throw it on without any thought and immediately strike the right balance between casual and put-together. It’s a deceptively simple look, and the addition of a white sweater feels like an appropriately seasonal update to the formula. The one I’m wearing here is hand-knitted by my friend Shona and softer than buttercream frosting. I’d normally wear this with a pair of Chelsea boots, but, for the first time in my life, I tried to be faithful to Gigi Hadid’s look here with neo-Victorian knee-highs.
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#2: Getting Thrifty, Resort 2020
Miu Miu’s 2020 Resort show was a masterclass in styling. Each garment that made its way down the runway, from drop-waist 40s-style dresses to baggy leather shorts, could easily be found at a thrift store. In other words, the collection focused on how to put together an outfit, instead of simply selling what you might need to make it–a feat that is both rare and hugely compelling. (Though I’ll note that having recently popped into a Miu Miu store to fondle the clothes for myself, I can confirm they are beautifully made and well worth their un-thrifty prices, if you can swing it).
Ms. Prada sends the same silhouettes (and sometimes the very same garments) down the runway over and over again here, and yet each time they look fresh because of how they’re combined. The aforementioned leather shorts were paired with a low-cut romantic white blouse, a preppy horseshoe-printed turtleneck, and a cardigan with boxy shoulder pads. This feels inspiringly authentic to the way people wear articles of clothing off the runway: many times and many ways!
Also, why have I never thought of using a sweater as a belt before?! It makes this vintage dress that I’ve been wearing for years feel brand new and decidedly more fun.
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#3: A Nightie and an Overcoat, S/S 2016
This look is perhaps closest to how I dress on a day-to-day basis–again, it’s no wonder I love Miu Miu so much! I can’t resist a minidress of any kind, but I’m really a sucker for those of the sleepytime variety. A more tailored overcoat (hopefully) keeps me from looking too much like I’m in my pajamas, and a tiara-adjacent headband lets people know that even if I am in my pajamas, I’ll make it a pajama party. I’ve also tried my hand at recreating these mismatched lace-up Miu Miu flats by lacing ribbons over my Mary Janes. Are you sold?
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#4: Après Tea (Party), F/W 2014
Having another why the **$3g*!* didn’t I think of that?! moment here. All this time I’ve been throwing Alpine sweaters on over my dresses when they obviously look much cuter underneath! Full disclosure, it was a challenge to zip this dress with a heavy knit jammed underneath, but all’s well that ends well. Pink flats and a headband make this ladylike ensemble far more appropriate for strolling than skiing.
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#5: Literally the Only Outfit That Matters to Me, S/S 2010
Bold statement here: this is hands-down my favorite collection of. All. Time. While there are indubitably moments that have changed the landscape of fashion far more than this show, this one alone has captured my sensibilities for over a decade now! I still remember seeing these images for the first time and feeling like someone had perfectly articulated the way I wanted to look: feminine, playful, and topped with a twist of strange humor. Just like any other form of art, this is what fashion does at its best. It identifies and makes visible parts of us previously unarticulated.
In a very broad way, I feel like I make reference to this look every time I get dressed, seeking out items that give me that same rush of self-expression and self-assuredness. But getting down to brass tacks, this outfit right here makes me look cute as heck. I loved it so much I wore it straight out the door after snapping a photo and felt like a million bucks all day long.
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I rest my case for Miu Miu. What designer would you hypothetically wear forever? What outfit?! Please don’t say snow pants and no shirt.
Photos by Ruby Redstone.
The post I Reinterpreted 5 Miu Miu Looks With My Own Wardrobe appeared first on Man Repeller.
Everlane Just Launched Leggings and We Have Thoughts
In partnership with Everlane.
Allow me to reintroduce a great philosophical debate of the 2010s: Are leggings pants?
I’m sorry I brought it up, but I’ve been thinking: If you define pants as “a garment that covers your legs,” there may in fact be no better exemplar than leggings. They are fabric shrink-wrapped to cover you hip to ankle and nothing more. No pockets, no cuffs, even the name implies their essentialism. What could be more like pants by definition?
Well, according to Google, “trousers,” which happens to be the entire definition of pants, which does complicate things, I admit.
Anyway, I never wanted to wade into this debate! But when the Everlane team told the Man Repeller team they were launching their first legging and challenged us to challenge the notion that leggings aren’t pants, we were easily baited. How could we not be? Leandra wore leggings with gold heels and no shirt last month! So we immediately accepted, and to raise the stakes, attempted to style Everlane’s Perform Leggings—out today and available in four colors for $58 dollars—for three scenarios we’d previously deemed activewear-inappropriate.
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See how it all went down below.
Leandra Is En Route to a Business Meeting
When do you typically wear leggings?
Mostly on weekends or on Fridays if I don’t have any meetings when I’m coming into the office. Occasionally, I’ll wear them as pants with heels, but mostly they’re my errand runners, exercise companion, or the thing I put on when I don’t want to be dressed.
How did it feel to style them for going to a meeting?
I self-selected this challenge because I’m pretty sure I have sufficiently cracked the code on how to wear leggings formally (with a blouse and heels, under a sheer dress with pumps) and casually (with sneakers for the gym, flat slides or sandals to run errands, with outlier flair pieces when I’m dressing for no occasion/frivolously), but haven’t quite figured out whether I could make them more professional. What was easy is also what was hard, because I wanted to resist resigning to a blazer, but found a good balance in adding the sweater underneath instead of going too corporate with a pressed shirt or something. The doily collar adds something softer, which makes it somewhat unexpected and the turtleneck is like armor for me when the weather’s cold to the extent that even though turtlenecks used to make me feel like a very judgmental drama club president, or before that a grade school student with a nose running perpetually, they make me feel very cool these days.
Settling on heel height and shoe shape was a tricky and nuanced balance too—I didn’t want a heel too low and definitely couldn’t wear one too high. I’m finding that like 3.5 inches is the secret sauce heel height, giving your ankle sufficient arch and comfort to walk semi-long distances (water cooler and back, repeat) confidently. I also didn’t want a de facto pump—that seemed too obvious, like 90s power woman-obvious, but the slingback works, mostly because exposing the heel of my foot does something I can’t exactly articulate to deformalize the leggings without actually deformalizing them. In sum: I think I accomplished my goal!
What’s your #1 tip for making leggings work in a non-leggings scenario?
Lay out the things that make for a non-legging scenario and reverse engineer, finding solutions for each of the variables without actually eliminating the leggings.
And most importantly: Who are you in this look?
Me, but wiser, more organized, and with troves of time efficiently laid out to get stuff done. Alternatively, the kind of woman who writes the foreword for a book about female entrepreneurship and teaches a course on Pollyanna at the local liberal arts college.
Mecca Is En Route to Drinks After Errands
When do you typically wear leggings?
I typically wear leggings in the comfort of my own home; dancing in the mirror while I clean or when I’m working out! Leggings for me are activewear, utilized for comfort purposes as well. So the challenge of taking them out into the city was one that I jumped for, because I always love a fashion challenge!
How did it feel to style them for two occasions, errands then drinks?
I knew I immediately had to turn my leggings into hot pants to make them feel like I wasn’t cleaning or working out, and edge them up! For me that was color-blocking with a bright turtleneck and adding some dimension with the navy blazer. From there, I paired them with a sneaker, then put an ankle toe boot in my bag for later. The last touch was the scarf. Nowadays I add one to any outfit for weather comfort, but this Holzwoiler one matched perfectly. After running errands in the sneakers, it’s so easy to change into boots to meet my girlfriends for a cocktail!
What’s your #1 tip for making leggings work in a non-leggings scenario?
A jacket or oversized knit! While I’m happy to drop down and give a Megan-Thee-Stallion twerk in the comfort of my own home, while walking around NYC I prefer a little more coverage. My biggest tip for making leggings look less like leggings is a polished jacket or knit, or dressing them up with a nice shoe or boot!
And most importantly: Who are you in this look?
Have you ever seen that episode of The Cosby Show where Aunt Viv goes on a crash diet and ends up out-dancing a whole class in that fire color-blocked outfit? Yup, that’s me!
I’m En Route to the MR Office After Yoga
When do you typically wear leggings?
I know I argued that leggings are pants at their most essential (because they are), but I pretty much only wear them in workout scenarios—like going to yoga or on a hike. Which is to say: Not often. If I’m running errands or working from home, I wear jeans, trousers, or track pants (although usually jeans, which I’ve been mocked for).
How did it feel to style them for going to work?
First off, these are good leggings. I think we all expected a simpler cotton legging, but these felt unlike anything I own. The material is super-thin, giving them a more athletic feeling (similar to running tights), but they’re also super-tight and smoothing (similar to yoga pants). I knew right away they’d be easier to style than most modern leggings, because they don’t have any athletic, patchwork detailing, meaning they look more streamlined with non-activewear.
Still, I’m so used to styling pants that hang off my leg rather than cling to them that it took a few false starts to put something together that felt appropriate for work and like something I’d typically wear. My starting points were this grey coat and these sneakers, two things I’ve been wearing non-stop for weeks (and consequently are Everlane). But the middle layers were perplexing. First I tried a sweater, which read a little schlubby; then I tried a blazer, which read a little try-hard; then I tried various turtlenecks and jackets before I landed on this button-down which, when paired with the pants, created a color-blocking effect that made me feel more dressed up than I might otherwise. The white jacket I added last (when I saw the temperature outside). The final move was swapping out my white socks for red ones, which Harling suggested to me via text. Red socks make everything better.
This probably more closely resembles a weekend outfit for most people, but I’d happily wear this to work at Man Repeller (and did). I love that it wouldn’t require a full outfit change after going to a yoga class in the morning, which is one of the biggest deterrents to me actually going.
What’s your #1 tip for making leggings work in a non-leggings scenario?
Pairing them with a stream-lined coat! This is something I explored a bit in a recent story about Larry David’s fashion theory—which is essentially the idea that pairing something nice with something casual creates a memorable kind of tension.
And most importantly: Who are you in this look?
Someone who fits a workout in every day and never forgets a birthday. And maybe my mom in the 80s.
Photos by Shana Trajanoska.
The post Everlane Just Launched Leggings and We Have Thoughts appeared first on Man Repeller.
January 21, 2020
I Asked 1,000+ People About Crying at Work and the Answers Are… Emotional
Like hysterical laughter and genuine surprise—things I also picture on the train en masse—tears are a universal human response. Cutting and pasting moments we’ve all shed them to create a histrionic collage of 50 lachrymose people may seem a little deranged, but doesn’t the result sound kind of touching and human? (Please nod.) I’ve been thinking a lot about this image over the last week, because it’s been repeating in my mind in various iterations since I started researching the phenomenon of crying at work—an experience nearly as universal as crying itself, according to my unscientific polls.
As responses poured in about people weeping in their office bathrooms, holding back tears in meetings with their managers, and running to parking lots for good car cries, I couldn’t help but picture the entire Earth-bound workforce sniffling at the same time. And just like on the train, the result was strangely endearing and unspecifically distressing, but on a global scale. What I quickly learned is that crying at work is almost its own emotion—with distinct rules, norms, and idiosyncrasies. Below I’ve organized my research for your perusal. It covers where people are crying, from freezers to classrooms; who is crying—do men cry as much as women?; why we’re crying; and interestingly, how to cry at work with more panache (a skill I now possess).
I offer up this important research, whittled down from 1,200+ responses into a representative few, to anyone concerned with establishing work boundaries or, conversely, a better repertoire of low-key places to let a few go.
The Most Popular Place to Cry at Work
“I go to the bathroom or just silently weep at my desk and hope Matt the developer doesn’t make eye contact with me…. I try to keep it a secret because if anyone asks me what’s wrong, it just gets worse. “
[image error]“When my company was considering introducing gender-neutral toilets, management held a meeting for people to vocalize opinions. There was one comment made that I thought was interesting—a colleague felt that ‘lots of women cry in the toilets but wouldn’t feel comfortable in front of men.'”
“I cry in the toilets. And it’s not ‘ugly’ crying—it’s worse, because I try to keep it together and I end up feeling even worse for being this emotional while at work.”
“I often tear up at my desk and try to hide it. When I can’t hide it and it’s too much, I go to the bathroom where there’s a stall that’s darker than all the others. Somehow it feels more private.”
“I cry in the one-stall bathroom at work (it has a door that locks so you’re alone). I get overwhelmed occasionally; it’s not that anything is ‘wrong,’ just that my emotions come to a head and I need a release.”
Determining Where to Cry
“I lightly cry at my desk if I think it will go away quick—a single tear and no body-shaking. If it’s a semi-bad cry, I go to the fourth stall in the bathroom because it has a cool tile wall to lean against. For bad sobs, I go over by the freight elevators because it has little-to-no foot traffic and is loud.”
“Either bathroom, freight elevator, or stay at my desk and cry right into my computer.”
“If I can hold it in, I’ll escape to the bathroom to cry, but I’ve also cried in meeting rooms with colleagues during stressful discussions. Our office is ‘open concept’ and most of our meeting rooms have windows so anyone who walks by in the office can see in. But we have one meeting room with no windows that people in the office have dubbed ‘the crying room.’”
“In the summer I cry on the office roof because no one really goes up there, but in the winter I’m more of a backstairwell crier, lol.”
The Poetically Placed Cry
“I cry behind ancient ruins! I’m a grad student who works on an archaeological dig in Greece and when I’m overwhelmed (often), I say I’m going to measure something in the furthest hidden block fields (where we arrange ancient marble blocks from temples, etc) and have a little cry.”
“I work at a university, so when I need to cry I go to the fourth floor of the library and cry in the stacks, private and quiet, good for meditating too.”
“Depends if you can hold it in and manage to run before anyone sees you. I personally used to hide in the microscope room during my PhD. It was dark and hidden.”
“My experiences as a fashion intern have triggered many (often UPS-related) breakdowns. Thankfully, working in a fashion closet allows one to simply shut the door and cry one’s heart out to the nearest Bottega boots or Marc Jacobs gown.”
The Walk-In Freezer Phenomenon
“Walk-in fridge! (Restaurant staff KNOW THIS.)”
“When I worked in a restaurant my boss got so mad when I didn’t know the table numbers for a party and he was very scary when he was mad, literally raising his voice and stuff and he used to be in the army, so I just felt awful. And so I cried in the bathroom, the freezer, the kitchen, the fridge, and in the server’s station…”
“The freezer or the bathroom—but I prefer the freezer because I can say my face is red from it and it also helps in depuffing my face. I prefer to keep it a secret at work so people don’t consider me weak/don’t want it to spread as the hottest workplace gossip!”
“I cry in the walk-in fridge (restaurant job) or outside (office job). Queen of the crying at all jobs here.”
Crying Inside (and Outside) the Classroom
“I’m a teacher and I have been crying at my desk 0.5 seconds before students came in and then had to suck it the fuck up, teach for 45 minutes, only to immediately go back to crying. Sometimes my kids will say things like, ‘Why are your eyes so red?’ and I usually chalk it up to bad allergies.”
“I’ve cried at work hearing about the home life of some students. Also teenage boys cry quite a bit in my experience. And the ‘tougher’ the boy comes across, the more likely he’ll cry when in trouble with the principal. I watch them get older and train themselves out of it. The shift is around 15-16. Many then channel the emotion into anger/rage or they ‘shut down’ and stop caring—the ‘too cool to care’ approach.””I’m a middle school teacher and if I’m not crying in front of my students (it’s US history and we get into a lot of powerful social stuff), I sit in a corner of my classroom and turn the lights off. More recently I’ve been trying to cry in the ~bosom~ of other teachers though! I’m working on being vulnerable with emotions so I can experience the profundity of realizing I’m not alone. It also invites my coworkers to be similarly vulnerable.”
“Only did it once because I am a high school teacher, and if I have to cry, I try to ‘hold it’ until ‘m done for the day…. In jobs where you have to maintain a strict affect, you don’t have the luxury to be quite as conspicuously distressed.”
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“I cry in the bathroom or my own classroom if there isn’t a class in. The bathroom sucks though because inevitably someone else always wants to use it when I’m right in the middle of a good cry. I cry at work a lot and I told a male coworker this once over drinks, and he surprised me by saying, ‘Yeah, me too,’ and then I wondered why I was so surprised. Guess there’s some internalised sexism happening there that I totally need to work on.”
But Do Doctors Cry at Work?
“I cry at work a lot. I’m a doctor in early training so we all cry, including our male colleagues. We cry in supply closets, bathrooms, low-volume badge-access hallways. It’s a communal lifestyle.”
“I’m a doctor in a fellowship program and I let it all out with my co-fellows who have had the same rough days. I try to never let my bosses or people who report to me see me cry! There is definitely a pressure in medicine to be tough and not display weakness or vulnerability. Things I cry over: sad patient outcomes or deaths, bad personal insults/slights, issues with interpersonal relationships, and also feelings of anger and frustration.”
“I’m a veterinarian and I love my job but at times it can be overwhelming and very sad. I tend to cry most when I’m overwhelmed with too many difficult cases at once or when I get pulled in too many directions. We have a doctor’s office where I do paperwork and make phone calls. I will excuse myself to this area when I feel the tears welling up. The technicians use our doctor’s office sometimes too. It’s a quiet place to have a cry and collect your thoughts before returning to the floor.”
“I keep crying a secret 100%. I cry in the bathroom or outside. I’m a hospital-based doctor and there’s still very much a sense that crying or having an emotional reaction openly at work [implies] weakness (even though there’s so much dialogue out there around wellness/mental health for health professionals now).”
Why Women Cry
“I tend to cry when I feel misunderstood, frustrated, or like I’ve been put in a compromising and unfair position, often an outcome of nuanced sexism in the workplace that I start to feel crazy if I try to point out or explain in the moment.”
“I generally think I cry out of frustration—being angry or frustrated at work is the worst because you can’t be angry at work! Or at least it’s difficult to do anything about it in a professional manner before you’ve had a chance to calm down. So it tends to lead to tears for me. I do it privately because I suppose I’ve been conditioned to feel weak and overly emotional when I cry in the context of work. Which is dumb bullshit, but pervasive nonetheless.”
“I’ve cried because the strain of being the only POC working with clueless white people gets to be TEW MUCH.”
“I cry when I perceive I’m being fucked over or when someone has totally fucked something up and it’s either thrown to me or ripped out of my hands. I smoke weed and it helps me rationalize other people’s actions, cut them slack, and make sure I’m not taking things personally. Never take it personally, even if it is personal. You’re being paid for the work, no one said it would be easy. Just bury it and get the job done. (I tell myself these things over and over and over.)”
“I work in film production. I’m the only woman at our company and I always get tasked with dumb things like cleaning and taking notes, even though my boss wants me to act like a ‘partner’ or ‘peer’ and manage others. I essentially am his personal assistant and a producer. Which doesn’t work. So I cry a lot. “
“I used to cry fairly regularly at my old job, mostly when I felt patronized and belittled by regional (male) managers. There were two in particular that made me so frustrated I’d cry after most phone calls or store visits.”
“Workplaces where I’ve cried regularly about work are ones I’ve left, because they were unhealthy. My girlfriends who cry regularly at work are all in unhealthy work environments. None of my male friends have ever reported crying at work that I can recall.”
Why Men Cry
“I typically cry when I’m angry. It’s my outlet instead of kicking [someone] in the shin.”
“I’ve only cried once in the printer room after my art director made me redraw [something] 10 times…. He got angry and said some things that made me feel like I wasn’t talented enough. So I took a walk and stepped inside the printer room and just started to cry.”
“My boss was super condescending and manipulative. I wanted to go outside and cry but the elevators took forever so I’m pretty sure tears started flowing before I could get out.”
“Exhausted, overworked, overwhelmed.”
“As a delivery driver I’ve cried when I’ve felt that a day was working against me. I also fell recently and that caused me to cry!”
“I never cry at work. I cried on New Year’s Eve because I cancelled my plans but felt guilty about it.”
“I’m a music student and I legitimately cry ~4 days a week while practicing my instrument.”
“I cried at work after being confronted about a mistake at a job I admittedly wasn’t very good at.”
“I’ve cried so many times before a stressful shoot, I can’t even tell you. Sometimes I need a good cry just to let it all out and then get my shit together…. The funny thing is I still mostly love my job! It just gets super fucking stressful sometimes. And when you’re in a role of power you’re not supposed to show any sign of weakness or else you’re seen as incapable. (Though it’s much more difficult and complicated as a woman I’m sure.) I’ve had people who are on my crew come up to me after a job and say they admire how composed I seem. And it’s sad that I have to outwardly put that on… little do they know, we’re all a mess inside most of the time. And I straight-up tell them that now.”
“Two years ago my relationship was ending. I couldn’t take time off and I cried (@work) for weeks.”
The Gender Divide, According to Men and Women
“In my experience, women typically express frustration or anxiety by crying, while men express those emotions in anger. Not sure why, I wish I didn’t get angry tears! When I cried at work, I felt like people saw me as an ‘unhinged woman,’ so I wish it didn’t happen. But alas… hahaha.” —a woman
“I’ve never really thought of this in depth, but my first thought is that men sometimes let out their frustration in rage (e.g. wanting to punch a wall) or are traditionally more repressed in the way we let out our feelings. Crying is supposed to be a healthier or more productive way to process strong feelings. [I think] women are sometimes more evolved emotionally.” —a man
“Men can compartmentalize their feelings. I remember having a rough time when my dog was hospitalized. I asked my male colleagues how they deal with this type of situation at work and they said, ‘I just don’t bring my feelings to work.'” —a woman
“I only cry when I realize my anger is actually sadness. Doms tend to respond with anger and subs tend to respond with sadness, but anger [is often an expression of] sadness. Gender and sexuality are out, the sub-dom spectrum is the only true spectrum. Lol seriously tho.” —a man
“You will always hear more stories of women crying and men screaming. Both are ways to express the same feelings: anger, frustration, not being able to deal with stress. It’s just ‘not acceptable’ for men to cry or for women to scream. The men would be seen as weak and the women would be seen as hysterical.” —a woman
“I have [cried] multiple times at work… typically when I feel especially condescended to or like I’ve failed my boss/team in a way that highlights a shortcoming I’m insecure about. I do feel like I hear of my female coworkers crying more at work and, as to why, I’m not sure. Perhaps general hormone makeup, but [maybe] that’s just a construct we’ve been made to accept.” —a man
“I really don’t believe that gender has something to do with how we handle stress or how often we cry at work, I think it just reflects how we personally analyze and handle stress.” —a woman
“The only time I cried at work was a result of me having had a horrendous day before my shift. It’s a shame but I only tend to cry when I truly reach my breaking point. I wish I cried more often as I feel like it’s a good emotional release I don’t usually get. I don’t know why it’s hard for me/men in general to cry. I definitely feel a plethora of emotions that should lead me there.” —a man
“One time I cried in the staff kitchen when someone asked me if I was okay. (I wasn’t, because of work stress.) Anyway, she dragged me to the toilet where all my fellow females comforted me. Something about the ladies loos feels so safe!”
“My favorite story of crying in public is when I was running late to a meeting and I was crying on the phone to my mom about how I didn’t want to seem unprofessional and a woman walking by saw me and stopped me and said, ‘WHO HURT YOU?? WHERE IS HE?!’ which was immediately hilarious and comforting to have such unconditional support from a stranger 
Caroline de Maigret on Her Best Outfit Ever
In which I ask Caroline de Maigret, model, music producer, and author of Older, But Better, But Older and How to Be Parisian Wherever You Are , what is the best outfit you’ve ever worn?
People will be shocked by my choice. It’s very simple, but it’s the best outfit because it’s so me—a mix of masculinity and elegance and nonchalance. I have a tendency lately—and am actually doing it quite a lot—to take one piece and then add a monochrome look to go with it. I always find it quite elegant. So, here the big piece is the white coat. It’s Chanel, I wore it to to their spring 2018 Haute Couture show, and I was wondering what to wear to enhance it, make it come more alive, so I added a black turtleneck from Uniqlo and black pants that are also Chanel.
See All 4
I have tons of black turtlenecks. They’re good classics that go with everything. They work with skirts. They work with pants. I’m wearing one tonight to fly back to Paris. I think they have always been the classics of my closet. I find sweaters very boring and turtlenecks quite cool—it’s a 60s thing for me. They add a mysterious vibe.
When I went to university, people complimented my style for the first time in my life.
The first time I realized what style was, I was in university trying to hide my butt. I was trying to hide it because a guy in a club told me it was low. Not big, not small: low. But, you know, it’s a classic trick to flirt, where one takes the power over the other one. Like, “You’re lucky I talk to you while your butt is super low.”
Anyway, I was searching for ways to hide it and I went to my brother’s closet and found a pair of khaki pants. I put them on and raised them very high and added a belt because they were big. It was a Katharine Hepburn vibe. Then I also took one of his white shirts and tucked it in and when I went to university, people complimented my style for the first time in my life.
Instead of saying, “Oh, you look great,” or “Nice shirt,” it was like, “Wow, you have great style.” So I learned that by trying to turn something around—to find a solution to a problem, I nailed something.
I was more of a classic young Parisian going to rock and punk concerts—trying to escape from the path my parents projected on me.
Before then, I don’t even know what I wore—jeans and sweaters and whatever. My siblings and me were never into the cult of beauty. I used to look at the mirror only to see if I had toothpaste around my mouth. I was not a fashion girl at all. I was more of a classic young Parisian going to rock and punk concerts—trying to escape from the path my parents projected on me, studying political science at the Sorbonne even though I’d wanted to study art history. I was just doing things for others, but not for myself. My escape was music.
After I started dressing differently, while I was still at the Sorbonne, I was asked to model. That became my financial escape. I could get out of the home and leave my life, you know, for the first time, which you can’t do if you don’t have the money.
I said, ‘Oh, wow, it’s my last moment to be sexy. It’s my last moment to change my life.’
I’m 44 now, and if you think the midlife crisis is only for men interested in dating their secretaries, it’s not. I had one while I was writing my most recent book, Older, but Better, but Older. But it’s not about aging, it’s about growing up. As I’m growing up, there are little surprises every day that are not always pleasant. And there are lots of great things—the knowledge you gain, the serenity of understanding yourself, the way you learn to forgive your past. Suddenly, you’re not afraid to become your future anymore.
At the same time, it’s a very odd thing that little by little, you’re being kicked out of the youth club. But your mind is not changing—it’s your bones and your skin betraying you in a way. On top of it, society is expecting things of you. It’s telling you that men age better than you.
While I was writing, it provoked a crisis. I said, “Oh, wow, it’s my last moment to be sexy. It’s my last moment to change my life. Oh, I have to leave my—I’ve been with my man for 15 years, we have a son—I have to leave him because it’s my last time being able to have all the men I want.”
I told him I would leave and he said, “No, you’re not leaving.” I was like, “Well, I am.” And he said, “Well, I’m staying.” We’re still together. I do this every ten years.
Part of what brought me back from the crisis was my son. He’s an amazing, cool teenager who is kind. I’ve been very lucky so far—he’s quite at ease in his life and we are very close because I listen. During the time we share together, I’m there. But while my mind was completely nuts in the crisis, I wasn’t “there” and within ten days of me not listening, he shifted. He stopped calling me, or he’d go to a friend’s house and come home an hour late and not give a fuck what we thought. He was thinking, “If she doesn’t give a shit, I won’t give a shit either.” So that got me back. It was a great help—“OK. You can forget and you can fuck up in your mind, but not with him.” My best parenting advice is to listen.
When you can chop heads off ‘style icons’ and you still know who they are, that’s style.
As for my own style advice, hmmm… this is tricky. I have my pieces for when I feel shitty: The white shirt is always a classic one. When I don’t know what to wear or when I’m too lazy, it always works. And I know it’s good for my complexion. The black leather jacket is usually a sign that you can’t fuck with me today.
But, advice, advice, advice. Okay, there are a few styles that I used to like that don’t work for me anymore with my body changing. For example, I love the preppy look, but with time, it’s not stylish on me the same way. Although I did recently find that sometimes with pieces that I think don’t work anymore, if I just get them two sizes up, they work again. It’s almost the same thing that got me into fashion when I was at university wearing my brother’s big clothes.
I still remember the comment about my low butt, so sometimes I walk like a crab—it’s this weird walk where you tuck back so no one can see your butt. I still listen to people for my style cues. You pick up on patterns from people’s compliments—I’ve noticed, for example, that white is a good color for me. When I wear it people ask if I’ve just been on vacation, or tell me that I look very relaxed. And that’s what style is as well—overall, it’s a feeling, it’s a story you’re telling. When you can chop heads off “style icons” and you still know who they are, that’s style. Part of style is understanding colors and shapes and what makes you stand out and listening to feedback from people is a good trick for understanding this.
I always say that when you’re wearing the right outfit, you forget about it. Fashion is the first thing people see [that tells them] who you are. When you’re able to forget about what you’re wearing, it means you’re comfortable, confident. It gives you power. That’s when the day, or the night, can start. This outfit is a good example.
As told to Leandra Medine
See also: “Lauren Santo Domingo on Her Best Outfit Ever“
Photos via Getty Images
The post Caroline de Maigret on Her Best Outfit Ever appeared first on Man Repeller.
There Are 13 Types of Engagement Announcements on Instagram (I Counted)
You could call me the Katherine-Heigl-in-27-Dresses of Instagram engagement announcements, if you wanted to. I love love. I love love, and I love surprises, and I love hemorrhaging hours upon hours of my time, free and otherwise, on Instagram. So to me, besides babies and soap shavings and unlikely animal friendships, there are few social media experiences in the world sweeter than being a third-party fan of another’s “Will you marry me?”
Not everyone agrees. I know many who long for the days of Instagram when their feed was a mix of “going-out pics” and what everyone ate that weekend. And plenty others who find flex-y Instagram engagement announcements annoying. I recently thought about Miranda Hobbes’s frustration with her friends’ endless rom-conversations—“How does it happen that four smart women have nothing to talk about but boyfriends?”—after a smart/cool/funny engaged friend asked that we talk about literally anything but her imminent wedding because it’s all she’d been talking about for weeks. (She must have sensed I had at least 36 questions in waiting, but to be fair, they were mostly related to font and stationery.)
I know it’s weird to be so enthusiastic about Instagram engagement announcements; they’re super weird in general, if you think about it, like something that would follow the sounding of a renaissance-era trumpet:
“Hear ye, hear ye!
Friends, family; girl I haven’t talked to in over a decade but know both of us would feel awkward if we unfollowed the other because our cousins do improv together; cool high school science teacher who everyone in my grade told their drama to; sneaky spambots who said they’d follow for a follow but never did; old hookups; my friends’ pets’ accounts; etc.:
My non-platonic companion and I have decided to spend the rest of our lives together in a legally-bound manner. You may not be invited to the wedding but I wanted to let you know just in case you hear us use the word fiancé now, and also because we are socially conditioned to think it’s somehow shady and/or rude to not make this kind of thing public. Thank you!!”
(^ That’s how I’d do it, at least.)
And yes. I too read Jia Tolentino’s Trick Mirror essay about weddings and their always expensive, frequently performative, sometimes outdated universe of an industry. It was brilliant. But I also deeply appreciate happy news in my feed these days when it feels like bad news is the norm. Plus, like I said, I love love. I’ll never forget the time I helped a fellow passenger/absolute stranger propose aboard a twilight cruise of the San Francisco Bay–likely the moment that got me hooked.
It’s not every day one gets to witness a live proposal, of course. The only other time it happened to me was in front of a Belgian waffle food truck. Luckily, as my friends and I began to leave our early twenties and enter our thirties, people I actually knew started to get engaged and post about it online.
Below I’ve catalogued the 13 announcement types that have surprised me, delighted me, and romanced my feed over the years, in the hopes that you, too, are a fan. Or perhaps you’re considering turning your instagram feed into an Instagram Engagement Announcement Bingo Board given the mass proliferation of proposals to grace your feed of late. Either way, let’s gather in the comments section for a cocktail reception following the ceremony. You can tell me your thoughts about the readings while I sneak floral arrangements under my chair to take home later.
Jinx
As they say in the fondant icing business, there is no such thing as too much of a good thing. I have recently had the distinct honor and pleasure of witnessing not one, but two instances of a Jinx. A Jinx is where both participants of a couple propose to the other, often at different times and in different fashions, which means that I—absolute glutton for love that I am—get to scroll through FOUR different engagement announcements per couple: two separate counts of “I proposed/they said yes,” and two separate counts of “they proposed/I said yes.” It’s I-do-x-2.
Talk to the Hand
From the modern to the traditional, nothing says “I’m engaged” like a tight crop of a newly bedazzled left hand with a caption that says, “I said yes!” I say yes, too, please, while understanding this may be a controversial choice. (Also, please follow @notengaged for Talk to the Hand’s antidote, and if you like to laugh.) Here’s why I like it, in addition to the love thing: I have a medical condition called Magpie-Itis where I can’t help but be drawn to sparkly things–to the point where I, similar to a toddler, have to be watched around sparkly things so I don’t go accidentally putting them in my mouth and swallowing. Additionally, Talk to the Hand presents ample opportunities for manicure ideas and aspirational cuticles for all who seek.
BFF4E
I know it’s a cliché to say “I’m marrying my best friend” upon engagement (as you’ll recall: Harling is skeptical), but if you think about its sentiment, is it not among the cutest clichés that ever existed besides “snug as a bug in a rug” or “two peas in a pod”? I’d marry my best friends. Let the lovers have it!
Dearly Belated
As a person who identifies more with being late than my star sign, and who also, unrelatedly, experiences social media paralysis when it comes to posting things, I find great solidarity in those who post perilously-close-to-actual-wedding-day-engagement-announcements, seeming to just remember, about six months later, that, “Oh yea, we’re getting married!”
VH1’s Behind the Scenes
I love, love, love the full story. Give me a novella-length caption with emojis for punctuation under your chosen “we’re engaged!” photo any day of the week. Post the video that your friend took while she hid in nearby shrubbery to film your proposal and project it on my living room wall. I want to know who did it, how they did it, how they met even if I already know, the trials, the tribulations, what they both thought about Netflix’s gripping documentary series Cheer, when the wedding will take place, and what the hashtag will be so that I can follow along should I find myself not invited.
The Forever in “I Haven’t Showered in Forever”
They say you shouldn’t tell your children who among them is your favorite, so let’s just say I’m partial to any IGA where the posters appear to have gotten engaged amid a physically-grueling activity, without checking a mirror, and/or during a vacation (everyone knows that you shower significantly less than usual during a vacation). A dear friend of mine got engaged with a (clean) thong tied around her ponytail because her last elastic broke and she forgot what was holding her hair up at the time of proposal. Besides the fact that I’m writing this from the depths of an unintentional shower hold-out, I find myself especially endeared to The Forever because it shows two people so excited to be in love that appearances were entirely besides the point.
The Couple Who Cried Wolf
Some of my couple friends are so photogenic, so consistently in bucolic settings and around foliage, so frequently filtered in black and white with portrait mode on, so perpetually entwined in one another’s arms, that every photo looks like an engagement photo to me. I have gasped so many times at IG posts of this one couple I follow/would date, falsely thinking they were engagement announcements, that when they finally did get engaged and announce it, I didn’t even notice at first. I was just like, *heart eyes*cartwheel emoji*heart eyes*accidental alien* and kept scrolling, then realized, “Wait a minute, was that something shiny I saw?” The reason I like The Couple Who Cried Wolf is because they keep me on my toes.
Where’s Waldo
Similarly, I respect the casual, cryptic couple who really makes you look for the ring, decode three riddles, and follow one of J.R.R. Tolkien’s maps to the end of Middle Earth just to understand what the point of their post is. Finally figuring out that they’re engaged is so exciting that it can feel like you’ve just gotten engaged, too.
The Safari
The Safari is an Instagram engagement announcement featuring a hyper-zoomed-out lens, the shot snapped at the exact moment our brave proposer popped the question. It usually means grainy photo quality, but the scenery tends to be great, and really, when it comes to the Safari, it’s the emotion of the moment that I’m after.
Oops another story time: A friend once called to tell me about a hike she’d taken that I suggested. (Not that I hike.) She and her boyfriend were walking along, enjoying the sites, when they spotted from afar the tell-tale signs of a knee drop/open ring box. My friend, hero that she is, took it upon herself to photograph the intimate moment just in case no one else had. Once the pair finished their embrace-that-follows-a-“Yes!!!” my friend approached (slowly, so as not to startle anyone off a cliff), introduced and explained herself, exchanged numbers with the couple, then texted them the pictures.
BUT IT DOESN’T END THERE.
A few hours later, I’m scrolling through Instagram, and I see the very same photos in my feed. Before I could mildly judge my friend for doing something strange like posting a total stranger’s proposal, I realized: holy on high—my friend who took the pictures didn’t post these; the couple who got engaged did. I am not only Instagram and IRL friends with them, I was best friends with the proposer in middle school!! The world is small and romantic!
Anyway, I love the Safari method.
The Immediate Phone Call
There is always that one person who gets engaged who you may or may not have dated in a former life whose romantic news requires an immediate phone call to your most trusted council. That is all. I am neutral on this one but felt obligated to include.
The How
Choosing a favorite Instagram engagement announcement style is like asking me to choose a favorite tooth (impossible!), but I do have a particular soft spot for The How. The How, or, the How?, is when two people from entirely different phases/worlds of your life somehow, magically, miraculously, wind up with one another, and you had no idea they knew one another, nor any idea how or why they’d ever meet. Former college classmates, high school classmates, and middle school classmates who didn’t really know one another in school but wind up together also fall in this same category. It’s like a real life romcom ending and I can’t get enough and I LOVE IT! More!
The Who?
Sometimes people on my IG feed get engaged and I literally just have no idea who they are and it’s like walking past a wedding party in a hotel where I happen to be staying: a thrill.
The Greatest Showman
Last but not least on this brief list.
My love of the Greatest Showman—a filmed-and-posted fanfare—has deep roots in my early engagement infatuation days, pre-Instagram, when viral YouTube proposals reigned supreme amid my browser history. Two favorites of yore that I highly recommend:
A “lip dub” proposal set to Bruno Mars’s “Marry You,” as seen from the future bride’s egregiously un-safe POV: an open hatchback of a Honda CRV, her legs dangling over moving ground, the message being, I assume, “If you can survive this, marriage is a piece of wedding cake.”
The other: a flash mob dance proposal inside Home Depot, which, if this isn’t at least similar to how I end up getting engaged, location included (sorry in advance for copying you two), then I’m not getting married, period.
Feel free to still ask me, though!
Graphic by Maggie Hoyle
The post There Are 13 Types of Engagement Announcements on Instagram (I Counted) appeared first on Man Repeller.
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