 |
| Only my mother wore pearls |
This is a picture of my sister, my mother, and me on my wedding day in 1977. My mother's in silk, I'm in polyester. She's wearing a string of pearls, I'm not. I didn't own any. I inherited a string of my mother's pearls, and sometimes I put them on, think "you look stodgy," and take them off right away.
This morning I figured out that I could read "The Lady," my favorite British women's magazine, online. First article that caught my eye: "Girls in Pearls" (apparently"girls" is not perjorative in the UK the way it is in Berkeley). Readers sent in photos of themselves in pearls, from childhood to their nineties. One woman said she'd worn pearls for 72 years. The editors added these observations:
* "As a woman matures, the pearls she wears can become more impressive...[but] only those over 50 should attempt to pull off a three-strander.."
* "Rather like a lovely bunch of flowers that distracts from a shabby drawing room, pearls on a woman tactfully draw the eye away from crow's feet and dimpling flesh--and add a little magic instead."
Bucked up, I read on:
*Pearls are romantic, add instant chic and don't look daft on the school run or overdone when walking the dog." [my italics].
Encouraged, I got out my mother's pearls and put them. Not chic and definitely daft for going to Berkeley Bowl.
1 comment:
As I sit here wearing my three-stand pearl necklace, I have to laugh. While I do not put them on to go to the grocery store, I often wear them to work, and then I stop in the grocery store on the way home. I am, of course, over 50, and the pearls, of course, are fake, so maybe that mitigates the sin. I did, however, wear pearls--real ones--at my own wedding. They were a gift from my in-laws. I was not over 50.
Post a Comment