It's Me, Sara Louise

1. My mother travelled a lot when I was a child. Instead of Where’s Waldo, it was like, Where’s Mommy. But she was a good Mom and when she’d return she’d always phone my teachers and ask how I was during the week. One time, my kindergarten teacher told my mother a little story (one that I was unaware had happened until my mother informed me years later).

It was recess, and I was wearing my mauve and green Gloria Vanderbilt sweater and my mauve Pierre Cardin corduroy skirt (my nickname totally should have been Muffy). It was slide time, and as I slid down, my teacher  looked up, and oops, little Sara wasn’t wearing any panties! (See, little girls really do need their mommies). There I was, sliding down the slide, showing off my good girl for all of St Georges to see. I was Britney before Britney.

2. Around third grade I used to rock the Punky Brewster look. This meant one baby blue converse and one pink converse, both with actual lace replacing the normal laces. This is my childhood look I’m most proud of.

3. In 8th grade, I went to a military prep school. I didn’t have a boyfriend because 1. I was in 8th grade, and 2. I was super duper awkward, but at the last minute, like literally the day of, a friend asked me if I could be his date to the military ball. Um, OK, because 14 year old girls always have spare ball gowns lying around. Well I didn’t, but luckily my dorm mate and 8th grade BFF did. Her mother designed couture, and had a house in the city stocked full of neglected gowns. So my friend picked one out for me… a definite one of a kind in an orange satin. Now orange happens to be my color (I’m not making this up, orange looks good on me) but the dress wasn’t exactly sized to my petite 8th grade measurements (and I’m not talking about my height). So there I am, in a $5,000 orange satin dress that’s heavily beaded bodice is continually slipping farther and farther down my petite chest. My friend had the typical 14 year old answer, lets just stuff some toilet paper in there. Great idea. As I stood next to my escort looking dapper in his formal military uniform, posing for our picture with a line of other cadets and dates waiting for their turn, the toilet paper slipped down and fell out of the bottom of my dress. No, that wasn’t embarrassing at all. S CA R R E D  FOR  L I F E 

4. When I was 15, I was in NYC with my friend Bun. I was wearing an outfit that’s memory makes me shudder;  palazzo pants (we were all about the palazzo pants) and a pair of shoes with a pointy toe (that damn pointy toe). As Bun and I walked up the stairs of Rockefeller Centre with our 15 year old struts on (all the world was our runway), my pointy toe got caught in the wide flowy palazzo pant leg, I tripped, took down Bun with me, and then she took down the old couple in front of her in a game of human dominoes. I wish I could say none of the hundreds of people around us noticed. But that would be a lie. 

5. For my Junior Prom I wanted to be fabulous. There would be no Debs Formals dress for me. I found a picture of a Jean-Paul Gaultier dress that I loved, I sent it to my Aunt in Dublin with my measurements. She gave it to a seamstress and two months later, the dress was shipped back to me in a manila envelope (because the fabric was that thin and at the time, so was I). I’d show you a photo of the dress but that would mean I would be showing you my Junior Prom photo and that is never, ever going to happen. Ever. 

6. For my Senor Prom, inspired by this photo of Courtney Love and Amanda de Cadenet, I wore a slip. Like actual underwear. Life lesson learned: Courtney Love is not a proper role mode for teenage girls.

7. My wedding was thrown together pretty quickly, and since it was a relatively casual affair, I wasn’t going to get all gowny. But I did have an image in my head and it was this…