The price of high fashion? Two painful toes.

I'm off to Turkey in 3 weeks. After spending last years spring break at home, being broke I decided this time I'll starve if I need to, but I'm going somewhere. Turkey was a great choice at the time since I have some really good Turkish friends living in Istanbul [ they were exchange students at school for a semester ] - and I wont incur hotel expenses. I'll also get to see Turkey from the eyes of a local, which in my opinion, opens up a depth in a place which is not visible to the tourist eye.

Thanks to political instability and civilian violence in Egypt and Athens, my grand plans of visiting either / both places are now paused. I will most likely be restricted to places within Turkey only. I'm not sad, but realigning expectations when you dream of a Turkey + Egypt + Athens triple bonanza reduced to one place only it is definitely a let down. Rant out of the way, I feel better now.

On other irrelevant news, I broke in my bigblackboots today. They're these gorgeous 4 inch knee high painful monstrosities which make my legs look like they actually belong to Lara Croft. The only problem being, as is the case with all things sexy and fashionable, they come at a price - pain. While I carefully chose slanted wedge heels to give a heel-ish appearance without the clunkiness that wedges lend to shoes, they're still pretty painful to walk in. Therefore, as with my standard operating procedure with most things I buy on a whim and then never wear, I would often prance around the house in them for a few minutes, longingly will for them to magically get more comfortable and then, never wear them outside.

TODAY, I had to go get groceries - and i knew I needed just about 7-8 things. which meant not much walking around. I decided to 'break in' my new boots.

Armed with a spare pair of flats in my bag, 4 inch knee high boots, I did my grocery. I dint look much out of place because a) it was -2c outside today b) they're not stilettos. Outcome? yeh, they're painful BUT not un-wearable. I felt confident, sassy and probably sexier than I actually am. Funny how much a pair of shoes can change your mood!

Why is this a big deal? Thing is, I undermine myself sometimes. I'm too comfortable being comfortable that I wear only painless, flowy stuff while sometimes wishing I'd be sexy or pretty or other ridiculous things like that. While I am a very confident outgoing person, I do have the ability to self deprecate sometimes just because i spent so much of my life being a tomboy and doing the opposite of girly things. I remember wearing loose anti fit pants, socks with floaters, with superduperobscenely short hair, no earrings, no make up, no pink, no red. Therefore, although its been over 5 years since I grew my hair, I still have the tendency to think I'm still boyish, or that something sexy would look strange on me.

Last weekend we went out to Carnaval Brasiliero - in Austin. I had this one black dress in my closet since 2 years but never wore it cause it was a little too 'sexy' for me by which I mean it had a little cleavage, short and hugged the body. I got coaxed into wearing it that night and while I spent the first few hours that evening hiding behind my kitchen counter and covering up with my red coat [ which turned out to be longer than the dress and when I buttoned up the coat it looked like I was on stripper duty #FML! ] BUT, i gotta say, I felt great! By the time we got to Carnaval, and seeing the amount of nudity there, I realized I was overdressed. and had a fabulous time. And promptly got sick for the last two weeks.

Every so often we cut ourselves short. We undermine who we are, and what we can be. We stand in the way of our own horizon and our own progress. The more I think about it, the more I realize that often, our own insecurities are the sole cause of failed relationships, appearance related opinions, work performance.. thing is, we're our own greatest advocate. The more you believe in you, the more your boyfriend, boss, best friend, or dog will believe in you. The single worst thing I see friends around me doing is looking for validation from an external source - appearance related validation is most often the honor of boys - the often verbally and emotionally underdeveloped sex [ you see why this is a bad idea? ] good person related validation comes from people ONLY saying nice things about you [ this is a myth. Even if you are the NICEST thing that happened to mankind since sliced bread, believe you me there will be someone who hates you, the sooner you deal with it, the better ].. I could go on.

So how bout tomorrow, we all wake up, I'll do my thing and wear my sassy boots and be sexy and pretend I look great in jeggings, and anyone reading this thinks of the one thing they keep downplaying about themselves and decide to think differently? One step at a time!