Fierce

First off, people crack me up. American people crack me up even more. What is it about our lazy ass society that walking a block or two here and there is far too much to ask? You’d think you were pleading for their left kidney at times. When Megan and I flew to London on a whim for my 23rd birthday to see Kelly Clarkson in concert–hey, don’t judge; I stick by my loyalty to the Clarkson and was probably the only person who didn’t think her last album totally sucked–we were doing the tourist thing the next day, despite that both of us had visited London no fewer than 17 times, and encountered two American couples. Since they were so clearly Professional Tourists, and we didn’t even bother to travel with a map–yeah, I’m that kind of backpacker–we politely asked how long they thought it would take us to walk from Trafalgar Square to Big Ben, where we were interviewing a political activist, Brian Haw, who has protested, day and night, outside Parliament for more than seven years now. They looked at us, shocked. “Oh no, honey,” one of the men said. “You can’t walk. it will take you at least 25, 30 minutes. You should take the bus.” First of all, since when was a leisurely 25-minute walk on an uncharacteristically sunny day in the UK the equivalent of boot camp? Not only that, but we did walk, of course, and it turned out being just under half a mile, which took less than 10 minutes.Then, last night, when I arrived at Fort Mason and parked in the public lot where I leave my car each morning while I run to the bridge and back, I asked a limo driver where the entrance to the show was, and he pointed in that direction and said, “but you’ll need to drive.” Now, seeing as he was a driver by profession, I thought maybe I would really need to drive, until he pointed to the end of a pier–which was, at most, a third of the mile–and said, “it’s all the way at the end there.” I was almost insulted. I run an average of 40 miles a week, who are you to assume that a measly five-minute walk is beneath me? And we wonder why America is the third most obese nation in the world (thanks Australia and Palau for beating us out on that one).

But anyway. So why was I at Fort Mason at 8pm on a Wednesday night in the first place? Well, I attended my first ever fashion show, as I’m sure you gauged from the title. First fashion show, you say? This from a girl who lived in Manhattan through four fashion weeks, worked at various women’s and fashion mags, and occupied a cubicle right on Bryant Square? I know, tell me about it. It’s not like the fashion houses were just beating down my door to have me attend the shows, and even at Lucky, while 2/3 of the staff was out for a solid week and a half every February and September, sadly I was not one of them. Sure, I got asked to cover a handful of events, but I always “conveniently” managed to be out of town (shocking, I know) each time they rolled around. And shameless confession? I never felt cool enough to attend a fashion show–I still don’t.

And so when a super-cute fashion publicist (whose name will remain redacted seeing as everyone with a computer has Google Alerts these days, and far too many of my professional contacts have been stumbling upon my blog of late) invited me to the Nordie’s fall fashion show preview/charity event, my first thought was, huh, fashion? In San Francisco? (I’ve seen some of the wackiest ensembles–leg warmers on arms, paired with a silk dress, beads and Converse kicks–I definitely don’t consider it any sort of fashion mecca.) Followed by a quick, of course I’ll be there! My initial concern was what to wear, because while I have well over 100 dresses filling my dresser, my closet and Lisa’s (no exaggeration), I wasn’t quite sure what was fashion-show appropriate for the West Coast. I find that most places I go, I’m way over dressed, which I’m usually fine with, but at a fashion show, I didn’t want to be a walking faux pas. I settled on this:

When the first two people I saw walking toward the warehouse were both donning jeans, I was worried that I would feel out of place, but man, if I was out of place, it was because I was too natural. I haven’t seen that much Botox, highlights and fake tans in one room since I left New York visited LA in April. And the outfits on these people, wow; you’d think Carrie Bradshaw had walked in and vomited all over the place. Taffeta, tulle, feathers, fur–nothing went unworn among the 200 or so attendees at this event. I was suddenly glad I went for neutrals, that way I could just sort of blend in and go unnoticed.

When I first arrived, I felt ever-so-awkward–strike that, I felt awkward the entire time–as I came alone and stupidly didn’t try to get one of my friends to take the extra ticket I had to keep me company. So I headed the only place I felt comfortable–the bar. I’ve never really cared much for fashion–sure I LOVE to shop and know all the big names and a bunch of independent designers from my days working the red carpet and toiling away at Lucky–but I prefer what’s comfortable, not necessarily what’s “in” that season. Besides, what writer do you know that can afford such lavish buys (except maybe Dooce with her $40K a month in ad revenue)? So I thought I would be on the bored side. But years of watching Top Model and Project Runway clearly educated me–or at the very least, made me more interested–and I found myself on the edge of my seat thinking, “gurrrrrl, you are one hot tranny mess!” And who says TV’s a waste of time?

Speaking of the seats, I guess the people who set up the show expected the models themselves to be sitting in the crowd, because they were so small and close together that the rail-thin girl to my left practically had her elbow resting on my right boob; there was simply no room to move around whatsoever. The entire night I couldn’t help thinking to myself the famous Emily Blunt quote, “I’m one stomach flu away from my ideal weight,” as I ogled all these tiny, odd-looking people: 50-year-old women whose bones you could see straight through their arms they were so skinny (not attractive), girls my age who wanted to think they stepped right off the cover of Vogue (they had a loooong way to go), still others who never should have worn a skirt THAT short (cellulite is not a nice accessory, sorry ladies; neither is a glimpse of yo booty).

There were 12 designer’s collections in all, including Cavalli, Versace, Stella McCartney, Donna Karan and Vera Wang (the last three of whom I’ve interviewed…Donna Karan? Yeah, she sucks in real life. Just so you know). Only a couple pieces in the 100-plus-outfit show would I actually have worn, but there was this precious pink-and-gold Peter Som wool coat with toggles that I fell in love with. Oh, I guess I forgot to mention, this was also a shopping event. Nordie’s was funding the whole thing and had racks of items from the preview available to buy, including an entire buffet of Jimmy Choos (luckily, I’ve never been much of a shoe girl, though I did lust after a $2000 pair of black suede boots…I could get by with a wardrobe of solely dresses and boots if it were practical). After I wandered out to the cocktail and “dessert” hour–dessert in quotes, because I never saw so much as a cream puff; SVV: “well, of course, there wasn’t food, silly. Models don’t eat!”–I stumbled upon the Peter Som rack with MY COAT on it. I admired from afar. The sales lady at the rack took note and invited me over to try it on.

“Oh no, I couldn’t,” I blushed. I don’t fit into model sizes, duh–while I’m not huge, I am a size 4, not negative 4–and all of the items were runway samples.

“Just try it,” she urged. And so I did, the XS-sized model coat. And it fit! Of course, it fit. When it’s an item you adore and you clearly don’t have the financial means to make it yours, it always fits like a glove. It not only fit, it was a bit big, which I suppose would be perfect when I needed to where a sweater underneath (though let’s be honest, who needs a sweater and a coat in SF ever?). It was love at first fit. Also, while everything else had a price tag, this did not. I had seen some items in the two and three hundreds. I thought it might be my lucky day (who am I kidding? when have I ever been the lucky type?), until the sales girl came back and declared it was $1650. That was about $1200 more than I was willing to pay, so I handed it back to her and said unfortunately that was not within my budget. She looked at her coworker perplexed.

“Well, do you want us to put you on the contact list when it hits store?” I don’t think she was understanding. I’ll NEVER be able to afford a $1650 piece of fabric, not today, not this fall, not ever, but I don’t think Nordstrom’s employees are accustomed to people not being able to afford their goods, at least not people of this caliber at that event who shelled out $250 a ticket just because they could. Sigh. One day, when SVV strikes it big…

But hey, at least I walked away with this platter, which is probably one of the coolest gift “bags” I’ve ever received: