ONDINE'S ESCAPADES

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love this outfit from London Fashion Week!!

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[macrolit]

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one of my favorite looks from London Fashion Week - Harper’s Bazaar

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Harper’s Bazaar

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We have to overcome the temptation to live on autopilot.

Dale Carnegie

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Shot by Simon Chetrit

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shot by Simon Chetrit

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Emily Weiss shot by Simon Chetrit

http://www.manrepeller.com/2017/09/nyfw-street-style-ss18.html

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Funky buildings in Chelsea

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Self-Care is a Privilege

Like many women my age, I have unabashedly joined the Glossier cult. I use their Rich Moisturizing Cream and Face Cleanser religiously, swear by the green galaxy mask, and groom the hairy caterpillars above my eyes with their Boy Brow daily. I even decorated my phone case with some of their stickers at one point! Their marketing is so effective - I even found myself tweeting and posting Facebook statuses about them advertising the personalized code they gave me, all so I could get MORE products for free. While I do believe Glossier is worth the hype, its toll on my wallet is definitely up for debate. Their skincare products do not contain any magical formula to them; while they are focused on pushing forth natural ingredients that are good for your body’s largest organ, I would not say that they work any better than the drugstore’s best salves, soaps and creams. It is easy to promote and advocate for a self-care movement that involves bath bombs, expensive sheet masks, and multiple facials when you can afford it. 

Glossier’s rise on everyone’s Instagram feeds (and faces…and credit cards) and the burgeoning self-care movement is no accident. The beauty industry thrives on creating concepts for women that make them feel like they are incomplete without whatever product du jour…thus creating a need. We are living in an age where authenticity from the companies we purchase and invest in is king, and the self-care movement has been skillfully co-opted by businesses looking to cash in - BIG TIME. When taking care of yourself and your mental well-being turns into a practice with a dollar amount attached to it, said movement no longer possesses its intended effect of improving one’s physical and psychological health. Hell, it probably causes even more stress!

The running joke on the Internet is that Glossier is skincare and makeup for girls who already have near perfect skin. If this is somewhat true, think about the socioeconomic factors that go into having clear skin. While part of it is definitely genetic (and out of our hands), having access to clean water, air, healthy food, regular exercise are just a few factors that can make or break being acne-ridden. For consumers lacking those attributes in their daily lives, purchasing products and joining the self-care movement can be especially difficult when organic face wash costs more than the stuff sold at a local drugstore. It may not be the most lucrative business strategy, but it’s important to think about ALL women involved if your mission statement claims to “celebrate real girls.”

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Falling in Love with Literature Again

Growing up as an only child, books became a comforting companion in my youth. As I read, I immersed myself in the worlds of fantasy and friendship written by authors such as Roald Dahl and Frances Hodgson Burnett and followed the adventures of their protagonists as if I were right there with them. When I got to high school, my teachers exposed me to authors who still had a knack for capturing their readers yet reveled in intellectual and psychological play: James Baldwin, Albert Camus, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Toni Morrison. I fell in love with literature, and I fell in love fast.

The natural next step of course was to declare myself a literature major in college. I soon discovered that reading in college was nothing like reading for pleasure. Now I had to cram 300 pages of Virginia Wolff or Gustave Flaubert in five days and be prepared to analyze it. Dissect to death the word choice and pattern on several pages that rendered its former magical qualities average. I stopped reading for class and resorted to skimming paragraphs because that’s all you needed to do to write a decent paper - and no one cared anymore. I cannot remember the last time I was left enraptured by the process of reading or finishing a book the end because I’ve been trained to no longer sink into the story, read at my own pace, and just enjoy. I considered dropping the major many times however, I figured the practicality of having a literature major on my resume would serve me better in the long run.

Since I have graduated in May, I have yet to dive back into reading for pleasure. My friends and I have decided to do a book club since we are spread out all over the US, and choose something to connect us all. First book up: Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. It has pretty good reviews online so I am excited to start it. Have any of you read it? What did you think? Has anyone else fallen in or out of love with reading recently?

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Behind-the-Scenes Polaroids of the Cast of Clueless (1995)

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you’re getting there :))