Steve - Conquers a Fear

So I went clothes shopping today.

Never done it before, not in real life, not for anything more than one item, not on my own.

I'm eighteen years old!

It's lucky my mother has a half-decent sense of style... even my grandmother has made some pretty decent purchases (she bought me pink, don't have to worry about... ah, nevermind, that's a story for another time).

But today I came into my own. I spent £200, which is a lot, but considering I've not had anything much in the new-clothes department for what must be two or even three years now, it's not bad. I also bought quite a few items. Sales are nice, they don't take so much of my money.

But why a fear? Well, prior to today, when spontaneity helped out, I'd had what can only be described as a mild to moderate phobia of clothes shopping. When doing so, I'd either avoid it entirely, or if not get very anxious and sweat and start shaking and all that. This goes back to my childhood/adolescence (hah) when my mother took me clothes shopping. I never really got into it very much, clothes I mean, so when she asked me if I liked something I'd just be like "Eh... 'sokay". That wasn't good enough for her, I had to like it. I didn't like anything, and I didn't like to lie (though eventually I did, of course, otherwise it would never end). She would get more and more angry and worked up, and I would get more and more upset and scared and thus indecisive.

It's fair to say we weren't exactly the Starsky and Hutch of the clothes shopping arena.

So today, when I do find clothes pretty interesting (patterns+colours+textures are some of my favourite things, and put them on people (one of my very most favourite people), I get rather excited), I am unable to acquire them save through the internet (and that, as you might know, is not very good for clothes).

But yeah, I conquered that today. I shop like a girl, I discovered, going through every shop three times before going around another time and buying what I wanted. I am a little ashamed of that, as I know anyone sensible who is with me would get rather annoyed... but I did it, and all that extra exposure helped me a bit. I can't say I wasn't anxious, I walked fast and kept my hands in my pockets (presumably so I could conceal weapons for stabbing shop assistants), and when any members of staff asked me if I wanted Help or there were too many people or I got confused about which gender clothes I was looking at (damnit Steve, one day you will wear womens' clothing and not be on stage) I would promptly run away and hide.... But I did manage to conquer actually buying the clothes (involving directly interacting with people and showing them what I had chosen, so quite a feat), and I even tried some on before I bought them (special fear attached to that, because my mother wanted me to try on everything and then show her and then tell her what I thought).

I swear, I should fix up a blog layout where I write on the left side and put my comments on what I wrote on the right side. I use parentheses and dashes and ellipses and commas entirely too much. I'm also quite getting into using 'and' a lot, instead of making lists with commas. I dunno, I just like the way it sounds. But I digress...

What I actually bought I'm pretty pleased with.

• Three pairs of trousers, two jeans one chords or cords or whatever. They've got colours. I like colours. They're also fairly loose, I hope. Tight clothes, though I do love them on boys, make me feel very self conscious.
• Four(?) shirts. Three button-ups and one top thing. The top thing was reduced to £4.99 because it had a joke about MySpace's Tom on it (dahling, MySpace is sooooo two years ago!), and this only makes it cooler. The older it gets, the better it gets, this is my idea of Good Clothes. The other three are CHECKSANDLINES. I got big into the indie-checks and colour blobs and stuff today. I think it's because I've only ever seen them on awesome-looking girls. Whether this is due to the clothes or the girls I'm not sure, but I want to be awesome and I want to be a girl, so it makes sense? They're colours too, one's purple (well, more a dark magenta), one's a bit BBCTestPattern-y, and the other is... something else, green perhaps? No, kinda a dark cyan.
• A magnificent combination of a button-up shirt that is actually a FLEECE. It is black and white and very cosy. I like it, maybe I should wear a tie with it? Wait, no, let's not get ahead of yourself here Steve...
• A COAT. If you know me IRL you'll know that I am always always always wearing a coat or jacket, usually my black coat with the Ukranian USSR commie badge on. It's a very old coat, three or four years, and a bit bedraggled, but I still love it. I do need a new one though, in case it... *sniff* dies :( Anyway, the funny thing was, I went into BritishHomeStores and actually saw the very same coat I was wearing on sale. From about three years ago... they'd kept it. It almost felt like fate. But no, I don't want to be the kind of person who does that, like the kind of person who buys their black office shoes in bulk in the January sales. No. Wait, why am I attaching my identity to products? Anyway, I wanted something new. So I bought a long (kneelength) large and reasonably warm black&white&orange patterned coat. I like it, I'm wearing it now, it's nice. That was probably the major purchase of the day, and the only thing other than the trousers that I actually needed.

GODDAMNIT STEVE YOU WRITE TOO MUCH. Well, not too much, but you write a lot, and you're writing in a different style here than you usually do. I wonder why that is. I think it's too much reading emoware (hi if you're reading this back through the referrers btw, I like your blog!).

I put a lindt chocolate egg in my pocket today, before I went out, and I haven't eaten it yet, so I will eat it sometime today! I like that. I remember I used to (probably still do actually) keep two of my favourite Cadbury's Heroes chocolates (dream and flake, if you're interested) in my colourful bag (need to use that more, it's lovely, it has tassels) (see what I mean about parentheses? >_> I'm seriously considering this dual blog thing). I found them in there once, hidden from about two months prior, and I got that feeling you get when you find sweets you thought you'd eaten (for those confused, imagine finding a tenner in your back pocket (also, burns, never say 'ten quid' again, it is not right for you to say that, besides, tenner is the word for that occasion), suffice to say, it's a very happy feeling). Back then having confectionery about used to be a great source of comfort, because I knew that whatever happened I could still feel good by eating it. So finding them made me know I'd been safe all the time, and they'd always been there. So I didn't eat them, I kept them there, as a fall-back, promising myself that I'd never eat them unless things got so bad I couldn't cope.

They're still there :) This was probably two years ago now.

Interesting fact, I get the same feeling of anticipation for good music as I do about confectionery. I'll sometimes be wanting to listen to a new album and be like... WHY AM I SO HUNGRY?!

I've always wanted to learn a melodic instrument. I have a harmonica beside me, that I bought a few months back, and I've never really played it. There's also my xylophone in the corner. Thing is... I know I'll start off bad and not knowing how to do what I want to, and I'm afraid other people will hear and... I dunno, makes me feel too anxious to practise.

Dunno.

I said to my mother today that if I wore all the clothes I bought today, and then jumped around a bit, and flew a kite, everyone who wasn't epileptic would be calling me Rupert Bear. Everyone who was epileptic would be feeling a bit ill.

Hm >_>

If you like my sense of humour, and I like you, I expect being around me in real life would be wonderful for you. I seem to be constantly finding the funny ways of looking at things. Even the news, traditionally not an occasion for laughter, is hilarity streets for me. I don't even know where it comes from, I just see funny in everything. Everything, that is, except Jim Carey films.

Oh dear!

Anyway, this is rather odd and I think I will end it now. I've got no work to do though... well that's not strictly true... I've got work to do but I've given myself the day off... to relax and write less...

Hmm >_>

Goodbye, lovely people :)