The Bloggomist: Acorn & Oak Tree
Fashion Opinion

I love fall. Changing leaves, heavy tweeds, hot toddies; the works. My experience of the season has been (understandably I guess) different in L.A. than it was growing up in New England. There are no major temperature drops requiring sweaters, no changing leaves to mimic with our own palette adjustments, and no brown leaves to crunch under heavy leather boots. 

Yet, the feeling one gets around mid-September, and all the trappings that accompany it, still seem to sneak their way into Southern Californian life. Fall is arguably the most evocative month — even the least romantic among us can’t resist the coziness factor, or the downright quaintness of winding around a scarf.

People from L.A. seem to take the sun for granted and transplants soon end up doing the same, or clinging to a nostalgic remembrance of colder days past (let’s be perfectly clear, I’m fully aware what category I fall into right here). On days when it’s unexpectedly cold Angelenos celebrate the way New Englanders do mid-May when the temperature hits 58 degrees. The novelty of actually wearing your jacket, your rain boots, or even a wool hat is too thrilling. They’re all worn at once. (And let’s be honest, it’s probably also 58 degrees in L.A. with all these things on. Oh, perspective.)

To be fair, New Englanders also experience an abrupt jump from the oppressively sticky August heat to the crunchy, apple-harvesty September cool-down. But, I’m not sure it’s actually just the novelty factor that ultimately interests us, and it’s not just the cold-deprived clamoring for signs of fall. For goodness’ sake, the weight of September’s fashion encyclopedias challenges our coffee tables to remain upright.

September fashion magazines are always the biggest of the year. Maybe it’s because of 18 years of Back to School preparation, but autumn somehow ended up eschewing its reputation as death-symbol and instead became a space of invention, or reinvention. Fall became the beginning, and the trappings of the season, one’s toolbox with which to cobble together something better than the previous year.

Yeah, it might sound creepy in a The Secret or Field of Dreams kind of way. (If you build it, he will come; sounds like a Cosmo headline, right?) But the thing is, we all pretty much do it. We’ve all got a little Jay Gatsby in us and the material with which to construct our best selves is that much more limited in summertime. Come fall, with its propensity towards layering, patterns and texture, and its implicit sense of meaning and romance, there’s simply that much more to work with. In fall, we start re-writing ourselves, swathed in fabrics, new colors and maybe a slightly new story.

So pile it on, raise a hot toddy and cheers, to the new you!

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For more by Zinzi, visit http://evilmonito.com/author/zinzi/.

Published on 17 November 2009 | 1 |