My lady at work was pleasantly festive today.

She wore an American flag shirt with a denim vest over it and a flag pin. I can only hope that if I had seen her walking, and not sitting behind the desk, I would have seen striped or starred culottes.

I remember that my nana wore peach culottes with a matching peach blouse when I was little. I was undoubtedly sporting gray, penny loafer-type shoes at that time: quite grandmaesque in themselves, but they complemented my sweaters nicely. The sweaters with dogs on them, complete with thread hanging down as the fur.

I love the cycles of life. We progress through seasons of fear and adventure, structure and freedom; from ashes to ashes and dust to dust. We start out needing diapers and eventually end up back in them. And we wear things like puff paint shirts and Christmas wreath earrings as youngsters, and go back to wearing them as cute old ladies.

At some point in puberty, we develop an aversion to these fashions, which stays with us until … after menopause? Maybe there really is something to this cycle idea. At our most instinctive level, during our reproductive years, we realize that pompoms glued to sweatshirts won’t do anything to attract the males. So we endure our child-rearing years in push-up-bras and fitted jeans, all the while waiting for the day when we can trade them for our holiday garb and dorky comfort.

Following this line of thought, it’s safe to say there won’t be any fireworks in the bedroom this Fourth of July if I don my sweater set with stars and stripes on the pockets, with the matching scrunchie.

Just kidding; I don’t own any of that. Anymore and/or yet.