Fashion Forefront at Rocking Horse

Leggings, jeggings, rompers, minis, micros, lounge, and activewear on the bottom. If the graphic tee feels too high school, you could go with silk, satin, cotton, fashion blouses with buttons, bows, frills and puffed sleeves on top. You’ll need to gussy up your exposed calves with bobby socks, slouch socks, trouser socks, compression socks, knit or nylon knee-high socks. The actual possibilities for the shoes on your feet are off the charts. I wouldn’t even know where to start on the subject of women’s shoes. Whatever your plan is for how you will present yourself to the world, you’re going to need cash on-hand or credit. If you’ve got bank you can dress for rank, and the sky’s the limit to rank-up. On the other hand, you may want to make a statement in your young life, that there’s a budget to manage. There are alternative resources for young fashion conscious girls like us; on the doorstep of independence and full blown adulthood. There’s a wide open space outside of top consumer brands the herd is driving us towards in a fashion themed gravity vacuum with no escape. We’ve got imagination. We’re thinking beyond school campus fashion du jour.

As a first year student at Rocking Horse University, I want to realize a new beginning in my freshwoman year. If I want to participate in the fashion arms race at my public university, it’s going to make a serious dent in my personal funds. Money I earned babysitting in high school, coding during the summers, and moving trash to the curb for elderly neighbors. If I operate within reasonable boundaries, loosely defined by my parents, then they’ll continue to help pay the bill until my school days are over. I fly under the fashion radar for practical reasons related to my parents, and to define my unique identity in the pool in which I swim. As I step up to the stage of a university, I want to retain these same principles, but I want to further define a singular identity for the young woman I am.

So, I want a style that’s low key and budget conscious for the home front, but I want to make a statement that rises above the generics. I need the opposite of the easy alternative of showing flesh, which my parents will flip-out on and my close friends will trash me for. No more dress code monitors from high school days to concern myself with, but the path of thin straps, high skirts, or tight shorts can backfire, and I might find myself cornered by a creepy literary arts professor.

If I accessorize or build layers of eclectic garb, I could become garish, or ridiculed as a throwback to the days of Pat Benatar and Madonna. I’ve seen old pictures of my mom in cute overalls that were loose and baggy. I’ve also seen some bizarro photos of her in a big shoulder woman’s suite with her hair all frizzy and permed-out. Altogether, I don’t think I can replicate something from my mom’s era and work to bring it back. I might even receive a mild approval from one of my nostalgic teachers living in the past, which would be death to my efforts.

Something clean and simple. Something that’s the opposite of showing skin. Something that’s not trying to reinvent my ancestor’s past. Something that’s within the realm of off-brand, and also avoids the late-teen to twenty-something stores trying so hard to nail my demographic. But it’s not some one-of-a-kind home made thing, which I can’t wear everyday anyway. It wouldn’t need to be my look each and everyday, but maybe most days on campus.

I was sitting on the front porch of my parents house, making my way through the last chapters in the last book of the suggested summer reading for my upcoming first year literature class. Across the street, our neighbor was doing some serious landscaping of her front yard. Mrs. Ashley was a widow, just a bit older than my mother. She was quite the busybody and a well known gossipmonger. I was fixated by what she was wearing. It was beyond an overall. She looked very comfortable, and kind of cool and professional. She was covered head to toe, and arm to arm in a one piece coverall. It was a bit more tailored than a jump suite and there was some sort of elastic at the waist to make the distinction of a woman’s form. It wasn’t form fitting enough to confuse her with one of those dress-up adults, out during Halloween in a super hero costume. It was more modest. With her large sunglasses and high top tennis shoes, she was a widow rock star.

Coveralls, I couldn’t stop thinking about the endless possibilities. In summer I could go with cotton coveralls with hidden vents. In winter, there were flame resistant (FR) coveralls and FR boiler suits made out of heavier fabric blends. Most of the coveralls were typically available through clothing suppliers for auto mechanics and hazardous industries. Reflectors on the forearm. Reflectors near the ankles. A reflector ribbon across the upper torso. Built-in belts and straps to taper to the waste. Zippers, buttons and oversized pockets. This would certainly stand out on the Rocking Horse campus — especially with coveralls in burnt orange and blushing red. Some of the coveralls looked like they were straight out of a NASCAR race. Some offered UV protection. I could wear my coveralls as a beach cover-up on spring break.

It was overwhelming and very exciting at once. I was already reconsidering my earlier thoughts about only flashing my new look two or three times a week. The deeper I went with my research and discovery of all the companies providing this outstanding category of clothing, the more I felt that I could wear this look everyday. I could become the coverall girl of Rocking Horse University.

There were no budget constraints in this category of clothing. I wasn’t outfitting a team to clean up nuclear waste. I was just assembling the pieces to my forward-looking-future, on-campus persona. I could start out super lean with my expenditures by visiting double discount online re-sellers of coveralls. I could even inquire about samples — in consideration of my hypothetical company making a large purchase at a later time. I talked with a business that specialized in overruns. These were overruns of extra small sizes of industrial menswear manufactured in China. No one seemed to want these articles of clothing, or they weren’t in high demand. Their market was actually women who liked to dress manly, and sure enough, they had a variety of coveralls.

I was so coverall obsessed. I had a really amazing dream after a day of research and pasting swatches of my future coverall outfits into my planner. I was on the main walkway of the Rocking Horse campus with all of the trees changing colors in the midst of the autumn season. I was approaching the big lawn and a cluster of pink brick buildings. Two girls I had never met before were walking with me and handing out coveralls to all of the students. The coveralls materialized in a variety of colors and styles. The students were so excited and crowding us with happy requests for more coveralls. I don’t know where we were getting the garments from, or how we were carrying so many, but we just kept handing them out. Kids were rolling around on the big lawn — pulling and squirming into their coveralls. They would stand and fasten the closure of their coverall with a zip, a snap, or a press of the Velcro. Then each student reached into a side pocket of their coveralls. They’d discover greater supplies of coveralls in their pockets, which they would freely hand-out to yet more students. Campus authorities and then local law enforcement appeared from nowhere and began to chase students across the lawn. It was a sea of old men dressed in stylish blue uniforms, armed with giant dressmaker shears and gold sewing scissors. They were chasing hordes of coverall kids in a rainbow of fabric colors. One fatherly looking gent in blue began to shout something through a bullhorn. His amplifier was malfunctioning or broken, and I could only hear a loud, high pitched buzzing. He was moving in my direction and the buzzing was getting louder. Finally, his words came through, “Breakfast!”

I shut off my alarm and joined my mom and dad for eggs, toast, and strawberry yogurt. Summer was almost over and they would take me up state to Rocking Horse University in two weeks. There was still plenty of time to take delivery on coverall orders with extended shipping to avoid additional charges. I could custom order some coveralls with my name embroidered on the front. One order targeted coveralls from a biohazard cleanup company that went under years ago.

One coverall for each day of the week. One very patriotic coverall for national holidays. One coverall for Valentine’s Day, and one for St. Patrick’s Day. One coverall in the school colors, enhanced with school activity pins and patches of the school mascot …Reggie the Rocking Horse Rider.