Anonymous Submissions
Do you have stories you want to share, but for whatever reason, you wish to remain anonymous? If so, Musings on Life and Love takes anonymous reader submissions!
First, make sure you have familiarized yourself with our submission guidelines. Then, click here to open our login page, and log in with the following information:
Username: anonymous_submission
Password: lemonvibe
Once you’ve logged in, click “Posts,” then “Add New,” and you’ll be directed to a window where you can write up your story. When you finish, click “Submit for Review,” and we’ll take care of the rest! If the story is decent, and if it adheres to our guidelines, expect to see it published in the near future!
Also, we may wish to contact you regarding editing of your submission, so if you’re willing, please leave some sort of contact information in the text of the post itself. Or, you can also leave us a comment below.
We look forward to reading your submissions!
Hi Dennis,
I thought I’d send through one of the silly things I’ve written. I, unlike you, do not have OCD and as a rule do not edit. I like to just let the words fall through my fingertips. Feel free to edit me all you like. Mostly, I write the story of my life as a 40 year old divorcee trying to learn how to stand on my own, be a single mother, and date full grown men. It’s more a collection of diary entries than articles but perhaps you have a need for something silly like that. Please do let me know.
best,
trish
MEN ARE LIKE PANTS
Posted on November 16, 2011 by trishialee
I’ve swapped dating for pants shopping. I’ve had to buy a lot of new pants lately as every 5 pounds shed puts me into a new size. While shopping today, I realized it’s really the same process as dating. First you have to choose where to shop. Go to the mall, to the higher end stores in Marin, to a boutique, to walmart, to the outlet mall. One must choose her price range, quality requirements and lifestyle needs. It’s a lot like choosing a bar on a Saturday night.
Once you’ve chosen the store (bar), you walk in, look around, get the lay of the land and start slowing wandering through, casually touching things, feeling fabrics. Your mind wanders to the various outfits displayed on feetless, headless, plastic women. Where would I wear that? Can I take him to dinner with my friends? What about that outfit? It’s a little dressy for a date at the zoo. These pants look good but they feel heavy, the fabric is thick and seems like it might feel constraining. You begin to slowly load one arm with pants. They drape over your arm, getting heavier and heavier as you hope some sweet sales girl will ask if you’d like to start a room. You pick out pants that you can afford and pants you can’t. You start to do mental math about how much they’ll cost with the 30% off. Can you afford them now? You find yourself adding things to your pile that you might not normally try on, but maybe they look better on than they look on the rack. You pick out tweeds and slacks even though you really need a pair of black jeans. You finally take all of these considerations to the dressing room. And you stand there in your panties and your jacket, putting on and taking off, putting on and taking off, putting on and taking off.
Here’s where the sorting really begins…..these have buttons on the ankle and I’m not sure if I like that. Will it bug me? Will it render them unwearable with boots thereby eliminating them from the category of everyday wear? What about all that flashy stuff on the pockets? Will that be all wrong when you’re cheering for the kids on the soccer field? We’re looking for something easy here Trishia, easy. Something that can find it’s way comfortably into any place in your life.
The pile starts to narrow. The tweed looks like I belong in an office or in 1987 and I’m not heading to either of those places anytime soon so the tweed hits the nope pile. I start into the everyday pants and then there’s fit to consider. Here’s where it gets tricky…..how well do they really need to fit? How well can one expect pants to really fit? Am I asking too much for them to fit perfectly, as if they were made for me? Do I hem them if they’re too long? Take in the waist to accommodate my curvy hips? Do I wear a belt with them? Am I really expected to buy a pair of pants that require a belt? I just want the damn things to fit. All on their own. Without me having to change them. And I’m sure the “pants” would appreciate that too. I don’t want to be one of those girls who buys pants thinking they’ll fit soon, after the diet or after I run a marathon. I want them to fit now.
The pile narrows to two or three pairs of pants now. One of them makes my ass look great but pulls at the thigh. One of them fits perfectly at the waist but makes my ass look flat. Should I compromise? Is good enough the best option here? Do I really even NEED pants? Maybe I could just wear a skirt. What would my friends say? Would Michelle like these pants on me? Would she tell me to just choose a pair and get on with it? Or would she be even pickier while helping me choose pants? Thankfully, every once in a while, one of them seems just about right. Oh wait, can I afford that pair? Hopefully the cost is not too great.
Finally, I am triumphant! I have a single pair of pants that fit my ass, my thighs, my waist, and my short legs. Hopefully it goes with the rest of my wardrobe and can hang with friends, dine with family, and go out for a night on the town. Perfect, I’ve found the perfect pair of pants and I love them dearly. I wear them often and make many different outfits with them. Then, eventually, I grow out of them, too big, or too small, or they get worn and tired and don’t like to play as much as they used to, they get delicate and require more care, and then the worst thing happens…..I’m racing my kid to the corner and I trip on the heel of my unnaturally high heeled boot, I fall and shred the knee of my favorite pants. They are unfixable. They are garbage. And now, having known the love of the perfect pair of pants, I’m standing naked in my room wondering what to wear.
Pants, can’t live with them, can’t live without them.