Eventually Becoming Naked

It is fashion week in New York, which means I occasionally get to see pictures of pretty clothes, but am also subjected to hagiographic television specials in which badly-dressed male talking head after badly-dressed male talking head tells me how fashion is the center of the universe and more exciting than anything else that has ever existed. They demonstrate this by making unfortunate comments about how New York is being swarmed by flocks of exotic and mysterious creatures and bright flashes of color (because women can be any number of things, but none of those things are people).

This is an example of the problems that occur when you declare everything "art." If fashion is art rather than design, then women's bodies are canvases. Like canvases, they are inert; they are vessels upon which the artist inscribes his genius. As when chosing a canvas, the artist may pick the size and color of woman that best suits his vision, and ignore the rest. The artist does not serve the canvas; the canvas serves the artist. The artist need not retain a canvas once she is no longer "fresh," nor need the artist worry about preservation once the work is done, the strain that might be placed upon a body by a poorly-structured frame. That kind of worry is for conservators.

This is why well-paid male fashion "artists" can sit around talking about how tremendously important fashion is while themselves dressing like shlubs. Fashion in their view is not clothing. It is art that is done to women.

Thankfully, there was a segment with Diane von Furstenberg, who said the following: My job as a designer is to be a friend to the woman. I want her to know when she wakes up that she can go to her closet and there will be something comfortable and easy that will make her feel confident throughout whatever day is ahead of her.

Thank you, Diane von Furstenberg. Thank you for your design.

Birthday

For my birthday, I got:

a wobble fox
lavender marshmallows
albums by Joni Mitchell and Atoms for Peace
a railway boardgame
lobster socks
Grant Morrison Superman comic
Scottland, PA
and A History of Food in 100 Recipes, which I recommend.

Ciro made me a hazelnut polenta cake and took me out for dinner at A Tavola.

This is a local locavore restaurant. I have a strong dislike of the locavore movement. I like technology and think it's absurd to say things like you believe in nature instead of science. Science feeds people and stops a lot of illness and malnutrition. I am suspicious of any movement that lets rich people feel even more smug and morally elevated about being able to buy rare objects. And I view as antifeminist any ethic which demands I spend significant time and attention gathering perishable food, then singlehandedly ensuring the safety of that food so my children don't die. (Women aren't neccessarily going to be the ones stuck doing it, even though they always have been? Give me a break.) Economies of scale, yo.

However, if you ignore the "locavore" aspect, which A Tavola is not in your face about, it makes sense that A Tavola would buy from local farms and serve a seasonal menu, because it's riffing on traditional Southern Italian recipes developed by people who would have been relying on tiny farms and the immediately seasonal. Much of this region didn't have access to things like refrigerators until a decade after World War II. Yes, seriously. People were living in caves. Yes, literally. Hence they use high-labor recipes that call for kitchen garden sorts of produce that could not be grown in quantity and do not ship well. A Tavola is essentially poor people food that is now expensive because of the increased value of both labor and land, executed very well in a non-pretentious setting (with good sound baffling, no less).

Anyway, it's a good restaurant and we like it. Small portions but that is because one is meant to order several courses. I had a pea, mint, and pickled mushroom soup; bread with a roast eggplant spread; pasta with rabbit and various vegetables; chamomile tea; and buttermilk panna cotta with wild blueberries.

The hieroglyphic gold and teal polyester kaftan from the 70s which I bought for myself with the intention of wearing it nearly every day in September? Thus far very successful, especially when paired with gold eyeshadow. My sister thinks I should stand on the balcony at sunset each day and raise my arms, for the benefit of passing crowds. I may make every September a single-garment month henceforth, in some combination of ceremony and vacation.