TMI

photo: Joshua Franzos

The quality of my writing here hasn't been great, or even good...for awhile. I apologize. It seems that it's most interesting when I invite you into the dark corners of mind and we both shed a little light in there. With facebook, twitter, instagram, instagram stories, youtube, and our personal blogs as outlets it's easy to live in this oily era of over-sharing. It's become so ingrained in our lives that it's actually hard not to just lay it all out there and let the chips fall where they may. Quite often there is relief when we unload something tough (or slightly annoying) from our chest and the rallying cries of support further lift us up. It is a habit that supports itself over and over. But sometimes, in this over-sharing world, I think privacy is undervalued. 

photo: Joshua Franzos

Ok, cryptic words, so what's eating you Gilbert Grape? Well, I'm still quietly editing and revising my novel. It is some hard, unsexy slog, which means I have nothing exciting to report on that front. Then there's 'Merica and this craaaazzy direction we seem to be headed and the systemic racism and misogyny is at a fever pitch. But there's some other stuff I'm not ready to drag out into the light too. It's largely un-formatted, un-packed emotions, and feelings that I haven't made sense of. Raw stuff that I'm trying to steer clear of here, and in my own head, if we're being honest. I truly hate to be enigmatic, but there are times that we don't need any outside pressure or perceived accountability to the world at large, we're probably putting enough pressure on ourselves as it is. I don't want you to worry reader. I'm fine. I only bring this up to remind us all that it is perfectly okay to not to be an open book. The real sacrifice is that my writing as of late has been scraping the surface of pleasantries, small talk, and merely leaves me talking about fashion on a fashion blog. How jejune of me, but I know you'll understand.  

photo: Joshua Franzos

 

photo: Joshua Franzos

photo: Joshua Franzos

So let's get into the pleasantries and how I've always wanted to use the word, jejune in a sentence. High Five. And how I never thought I'd type the word crotch here on this blog...(as in "Drop Crotch" pants.) Not that "Harem" pants are any better, (they're not.) As you probably know a harem is a separate part of polygamous household where the women, wives, and female slaves live separate from the single man they revolve around. It makes my inner feminist bristle. So drop CROTCH it is. (Sorry, crotch in all caps wasn't exactly a pleasantry, was it?) But let me assure you that drop crotch pants are. 

photo: Joshua Franzos

 

photo: Joshua Franzos

photo: Joshua Franzos

photo: Joshua Franzos

Not only do they hide some extra lbs, not only can you most decorously 'Hammer Time' in them, but I also think they look pretty darn cool. Like you've been to so many gallery openings in SoHo that all the gallerists know you by name and kiss both of your cheeks. Yeah, that kind of cool.



via GIPHY

What I Wore:

Asymmetric top: old BCBG

Red jacket: old Rock & Republic for Kohl's

Pants: past season ASOS White pinstripe drop crotch pants

Boots: Balenciaga here.

Gucci Dupe Sunnies: $16.99 from Amazon, here.

Bag: vintage Carlos Falchi butterfly bag

photo: Joshua Franzos

I'd also like to take this moment to point out a really awesome podcast that my husband has been producing for the Heinz Endowments, called We Can Be. It is local to Pittsburgh, but has many reknowned out-of-town guests that help host Grant Oliphant tackle some national issues. It is enlightening and beautifully produced (much in the same manner as a radio lab/love and radio episode). I am very proud that it is coming from Pittsburgh (and my hubby). I've embedded one of my favorite episodes below, but truly they're all good, especially including Mona Hanna-Attisha on the Flint water crisis and Illah Nourbakhsh on AI robotics and ethics. I learn so much from this podcast. I hope you do too.

Your Bosom Friend in Pittsburgh, 

What to Wear in the First Act

 

photo: Kathryn Stabile

I used to buy old Rolling Stone magazines from the Fremont Public library in the 90's. They were ten cents each. I devoured them. Cover to cover. The fashion. The album critics. The musician interviews. I read, I studied, I absorbed. I tucked rock and roll tidbits away in my brain. Rolling Stone always had a thing for this lady Patti Smith and her seminal album Horses. Yes, Yes. I'll look into her, I kept telling myself. When I was done reading, then I literally dissected the magazine. I cut all instances of Eddie Vedder out with a scalpel and glued him on my biology notebook. With his Botticelli curls, furrowed brow and a handlebar jawline – he was the epitome of sensitive 90’s masculinity. A real cutie pie, my oh my.

Shhh...this article really isn't about Eddie Vedder at all.

This summer I was in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) when one of those Rolling Stone tidbits came unfurling out of my grey matter. I was walking through the Robert Mapplethorpe exhibit, pretending to be cool, but there is a deeply ingrained squirmy patrician aspect to me. When confronted with large format pictures of engorged cocks and Robert Mapplethorpe stuffing a bull whip up his ass, believe me, I wanted to get an eyeful. But museums are a shared experience, where everyone is looking at the art and the people looking at the art. Voyeurism. It’s hard to pretend to be cool when you accidentally make eye contact with a stranger and have a full body blush going. They should hand out masks at LACMA. 

Photo: Robert Mapplethorpe

Anyway, before the pendulum of his sexuality swung the other way, Robert Mapplethorpe and Patti Smith were lovers and friends and he took many pictures of her. And there it was, next to a photo of an uncircumcised penis, Patti Smith’s album picture of Horses. I was more than happy to rest my eyes and socially anxious heart on safe, androgynous Patti. I picked up her book, Just Kids, in the gift shop and then Josh and our friends grabbed a (much needed for me) drink. For anyone who some how has an impression that I’m cool, I assure you that I’m not.Cool people don't care. I still care much too much.

photo: Kathryn Stabile

Have you ever felt like things were gaining momentum in your life and something awesome and sort of, fated was going to happen? In September, I started reading Just Kids while I trudged along on the elliptical. I liked Patti’s writing and the weight and feel of her words. Her recounting New York and her climb from abject poverty to rock and roll doyenne in the 70’s was especially interesting. I was twenty pages into it when the Carnegie Library reached out to me, and asked if I would like to attend a private meet and greet cocktail reception with Patti Smith before her reading and concert, part of the Pittsburgh Art and Lectures series on October 10. Of course I would. Jesus. I haven't thought of Patti Smith for at least fifteen years and all of the sudden I had a full house. I finished Just Kids. I listened to Horses. Hell yeah, why didn’t I check this out sooner? More Rolling Stone fashion tear sheets came floating out of my brain.

What I Wore to Meet Patti Smith

Leopard coat: Express, 50% off on sale HERE!
Pussy bow blouse, old, Victoria's Secret.
Leather Waistcoat, old, Mas Nada 
Moto pants, Prana Brenna Pant (so comfortable)  
Heels, Romy 100 by Jimmy Choo, HERE
Purse, old Marc by Marc Jacobs

I dressed like a rock and roll baroness, confident that life was railroading me to some defining and momentous conversation with Patti Smith. That evening, her handlers shepherded her out for a three minute development talk and then she was herded her off to the performance hall and that was it. It was a great performance, but I can’t deny the let down. I'd been so sure.

photo: Kathryn Stabile

photo: Kathryn Stabile

Same with the election. I was confident that America was thoroughly disgusted with a certain candidate and that we would have our first female president. I was so confident. All day November 8, I was floating on air, part of a secret pantsuit society and by 9pm I was sick to my stomach, knowing full well what the end was, but still unable to admit defeat to myself and to women everywhere.This isn't the America that I thought I knew. But what did I know? I was barely even an armchair politician until this election, but this election woke a sleeping giant within me, within a lot of us. Now, we are woke.

As a writer, I have a foot in both the real world and fictional worlds. To be honest, I long for the chaos of the real world to read like a good-triumphs-over-evil story arc. I think a lot of us do. So let's go with that. Many of us are reacting to the election like we just read the story's climax in the third act and we're doomed. But here's the thing, our story isn't finished, in fact, our tale is just getting started. Stories begin in the first act, with an inciting event-that's the thing that sets the story officially in motion. In our case, Trump winning the election is our inciting event. The thing that follows a story's inciting event is called the key event - where the characters (you and I) react. We mourn, we talk with our friends and loved ones, we try and make sense of it, and then we get to work. Donate. Volunteer. Speak up.Fact check. Support investigative journalism by reading it. Or better yet, subscribe to a newspaper. Pester your congresspersons. And don't ever accept hate as the new normal. 

I have hope that one day we will have a woman as a president and that one day I'll shake Patti Smith's hand.

"Anything in life worth having is worth working for.” 

- Andrew Carnegie

 

In other news. As you know I've been away from the blog. Thing have been busy and exciting! I finished the first draft of my novel. I've started a new story, a young adult fantasy (!) I created a personal writer website (www.merylahfranzos.com) to help me down the path toward future publication, and Josh and I finally went on our official honeymoon in the Mediterranean! - I hoping to make a post on that.

I'd also like to introduce Kathryn Stabile as a new contributing photographer here on my blog. I've known her for quite awhile now, and I'm so excited to have finally worked with her! You can find her and her work on the internet at www.kathrynstabile.com, on facebook, and on instagram @kathrynstabilephoto 

photo: Kathryn Stabile

Your Bosom Friend in Pittsburgh, 

Invisibility Jeans

 

photo credit: Joshua Franzos

Slowly, but surely the crisp and unmistakable smell of autumn grows stronger every day. The excitement of a new semester and budding, young minds is palpable. There's harvest moons, fashion collections, Pumpkin Juice, Butter Beer...September is a month ripe with anticipation and magic. 
 

photo credit: Joshua Franzos

Hot days, cool nights, amorous crickets...the imminence of fall is positively burgeoning, but it's not quite here yet. So we wait like happy children enjoying the remains of the summer before the cold, harsh reality of that season,we dare not speak its name, returns. But that's later and I, for one, am living in the now. I'm also living in these things called, boyfriend jeans. They've been here for at least three years and the trend shows no signs of letting up. Women be loving their boyfriend jeans. Since I consider myself something of a fashion anthropologist, do you mind if we dissect boyfriend jeans a bit? 

photo credit: Joshua Franzos

Boyfriend jeans. 

Awwww! He thinks I look so cute when I cover up my nubile body with his shapeless clothing! Yeah, those boyfriend jeans. But of course, they aren't his jeans. It's just a cutesy marketing term that invokes male approval to sell short, easy-fit jeans to women. For the record, he doesn't approve of them. In fact, he doesn't even know they exist.

"Harry picked the shining, silvery cloth off the floor. It was strange to the touch, like water woven into material.

 "It's an invisibility cloak," said Ron, a look of awe on his face. "I'm sure it is--try it on."

Harry threw the Cloak around his shoulders and Ron gave a yell. "It is! Look down!"

Harry looked down at his feet, but they were gone. He dashed to the mirror. Sure enough, his reflection looked back at him. Just his head suspended in midair, his body completely invisible. He pulled the Cloak over his head and his reflection vanished completely" (201, Rowling, J.K., Harry Potter And The Sorcerer's Stone).

Boyfriend jeans are the muggle term for invisibility jeans. Yes. Ladies, your boyfriend jeans are in fact cleverly disguised magical artifacts. I did some research. They are woven with the hair of a female demiguise which renders the wearer invisible to the opposite sex. Isn't that cool? Just think of the things we can accomplish without the male gaze. Like...we can sneak around Hogwarts at night and look at the books in the restricted section. Or walk down the street without getting harassed and catcalled by complete strangers.The possibilities are endless really. 

photo credit: Joshua Franzos

photo credit: Joshua Franzos

Mr. Franzos and I went down to the Point State Park portal bridge to shoot these photos. He pointed the camera in the direction of my voice. I think they turned out pretty well considering he couldn't see me in my magic jeans. I wore a cross hatch print cardigan over a cool shirt from Mossimo, which I like because it looks like a rusty old garage rag. I topped off the Ann Taylor Loft invisibility jeans with a ponyhair leopard print belt because I love to complicate things by mixing prints and patterns together. This look is a variation of my weekend writing uniform. I added these gamine Chanel mary jane flats, these fantastic two-tone Ray-Ban sunnies and my every single day Prada purse. I like this purse because it's small yet my kindle fits inside, it's easy to clean if it gets dirty, and it also fits in my laptop backpack like a jettison pack. If you've been following this blog, you may have noticed that most of my outfit posts don't include handbags. This is because I have commitment issues with handbags in general, but I also take my Timbuk2 laptop backpack where ever I go. I chip away at my novel during any two spare moments that I can string together. My back pack and jettison purse combo ruins my outfits on a daily basis, but that's okay because I'm really more of shoe person anyway. Tell me about your adventures in invisibility jeans in the comments below!

photo credit: Joshua Franzos

What I wore: Cardigan: Ann Taylor Loft, past season. Top: Mossimo, past season. Boyfriend Jeans: Ann Taylor Loft, here. Leopard Belt: Express, here. Flats: Chanel, past season. Bag: Prada, here. Follow my blog with Bloglovin

Your Bosom Friend From Pittsburgh,