Woman Seeking Button: An Internet Rabbit Hole
This is an email that reached its length limit and is literally about jacket buttons.
Welcome to Internet Rabbit Hole! A franchise devoted to the various rabbit holes that we fall down while searching the web for fulfillment.
It used to be that I would make plans just so I had somewhere to go, which mostly was motivated by my wanting an excuse to get dressed. More often than not, it didn’t matter where I was going, or who I was going to be with. So long as I could wear the outfit.
Lately, though, because it’s been cold as fuck and making plans requires real buy-in -- like true dedication to the person you’re going to see or the food you’re going to eat, I’ve been asking myself what makes socializing worth it.
Honestly, actually, I’ve never asked that to myself. This is the first time. It seems like a good topic to explore in my journal before I come out, toy guns-a-blazing, in that insufferable tone that connotes a sense of indelible knowing even though, truly, what the fuck do I know? What the hell do any of us know! But low stakes hot take first impression answer to my own question: a conversation that makes you feel warm inside, food that makes you feel full, getting out of your own head to enter someone else’s only either realize it’s not so bad in yours or that it could be better, it’s up to you -- that is what makes socializing worth it.
Clothes that make you feel warm in the guts are great too. They exist. I love them. I haven’t encountered the chemical sensation of a creative thrill as it pertains to getting dressed in at least 4 months, which does make me wonder whether this is a function of personal change or rather simply, the weather. At the end of February, not even a most intense patio heater will protect you from the month’s seasonal wrath so it’s best that one dresses for necessity, not thrill.
Shell tank, check. First-layer turtleneck, double-check. A t-shirt to wear over. A sweater over that. Maybe a jacket with flare. The sleeves might peek out of my coat, aha! But the coat still does cover it all. And as for the bottom, death be the feet that freeze me. I haven’t figured this part out yet but I was inching closer to the possibility of buying a pair of loafers that are a full 1-2 sizes too big and wearing them with two layers of socks.
I make myself sick sometimes!
The chase I’d like to cut (to) involves a steak knife for a cheeseburger and designer shearling-lined boots that I got from The Real Real for $85 last winter. Only peripherally though. Because, yes, there’s a cheeseburger on the menu at a recent locale where I ~socialized~, but I didn’t order it and neither did my company. And yes, I have shearling boots, which I did acquire for $85, but they only relate to this story because I did not wear them that night. Instead, like an idiot, I was in open-arch flats.
But it was worth it, and let me tell you why. My dinner companion, an editor in fashion with a heart made of gold and a soul full of pudding, was wearing the most divine collarless jacket. It was black with embroidered piping that looked like the trim on like, a French pillow from the 19th century. If you try to google this, you will most likely be disappointed by the result as it does not accurately reflect the rendering in my head but I am sure if not certain the reference is right. Unless, you know, it’s wrong. In which case, it’s that.
From my vantage point, the fabric seemed like a, like a wool boucle. It was lined thus giving its boxy shape a polished structure -- and it featured the most exquisite gold buttons. So exquisite I have to refer to them as such.
The t-shirt she wore under the jacket was striped (I think it was this one, but I can’t be sure; x Karla t-shirts are it) and every time she lifted her hand to her face, feigning interest in whatever came out of my mouth, the glimmer of the brushed gold signet ring she wore around her pinky caught one of the buttons and I, in layers of frostbite coming undone, started to spread like melting butter.
It always
comes back
So simple! So fresh! Instantly, I remembered the sensation of feeling inspired by people -- real people, not just their digitized pictures. And style -- their style, existing in real life.
When I got home, I launched an investigation. I knew the jacket was not Chanel because the buttons weren’t ornate enough. It wasn’t Thom Brown -- the sleeves were too long and because nothing was rounded about this jacket: not the buttons, nor the shoulder, it wasn’t Marc Jacobs either. Which left only one perpetrator: Celine.
And sure enough, I was right as they come.
The price did not surprise me -- $2,950 -- and as a matter of fact, inspired me. To identify this one collarless jacket I own, obtained from a second-hand store in late 2018, with two breasts full of teeny tiny velvet buttons festooning the front, then replace them with some gold buttons.
But where to find the buttons? Enter The:
Do I go matte gold? Or is it about a sailor button?
Maybe that is too literal. These are fun! But a different vibe. I know that vibe. I am that vibe.
Yet here I’m trying to escape myself without actually escaping myself. You can’t tell? Oh shit, here it is. Here they are.
Hey! I remember when I almost bought these wine glasses. Looks like they sold out. I knew I should have bought them, now I have to have them! Should I get another set, let’s see if there are any. Oh, there are tons. Spades worth. I don’t want them that badly.
But what about a coup, in which to serve an anise flotant? It’s the best idea I’ve had this year -- you put a scoop of vanilla ice cream in a champagne coup and then drench it in pastis or arak or raku or uzo...nail polish remover? -- whatever you call it, then call your invention an anise flotant.
Are these shot glasses?
And does anyone really still drink out of these? They’re like the drinking equivalent of a tiny violin. Don’t mind me and my minuscule glass! Suffering the most minor offense here on the lowest end of the lowest stake of my life of lives.
Steaknife! How about some steak knives? We don’t eat enough meat, we don’t cut enough shit.
Buttons, Leandra.
Should I get enough to sew into the shoulder of an old crew neck knit too? Or a sweatshirt. I don’t think I’m going to recover from sweatshirts. Will, however, wear the fuck out of trousers.
The inverse of videocall clothes, you know? Hey, should I get a batch of buttons that are mismatched to sew everywhere else? Chaotic ones. Unhinged! Nonsensical!
Nah. But look at this placemat Etsy just served. I could use new placemats.
Are these dumb?
These are cute.
These are better. But expensive.
Too serious. But precious. Or seemingly so. These are cool, they have fringe. I could joke that we eat ON THE FRINGE in this house.
Eh, not funny. But so, not these? Oh baby, these!
But I don’t really need placemats, who’s coming over?
My mom, actually, at half-past two. You know, I just realized that my friend Wendy reminds me of her sometimes. Wendy! She gave me a jacket.
The most divine, vintage Norma Kamali jacket — with its own elaborate buttons and all.
So it seems I’m good, we’re good. You good? So good! Welcome to The Rabbit Hole.