Now trending....

I believe your home tells a story about who you are and who you aspire to be.  We represent ourselves through the things we own.  I don't believe in trends.  I believe in collecting things that you connect with.  We should surround ourselves with things we care about, that have meaning. 
                                                                                                                             - Nate Berkus

Photo credits: Moon shot by my neighbor, Charlie Daughtry, used with permission
Groundhog screenshotted from Forever.com

Week 5: Trendy

This week's Day2Day topic got me thinking about trends - what's trending now, what trends have come and gone, what trends have been replaced by technology, and how easily we buy into trends that have nothing to offer us and that don't enrich our lives.  I guess I shouldn't be surprised by that, since many trends are inspired by advertisers and marketers, who want us to part with our money and aren't concerned with whether our purchases make our lives better.  Dilly, dilly.

See how easily that nonsense phrase has become a part of our national vernacular?  Of course, words, phrases, and jargon - heck, even emoticons - are evolving and emerging constantly.  It's always fascinating to me to see which words get added to the dictionary each year.  In 2017, some of the words added to the Merriam-Webster dictionary included foods - sriracha, bibimbap, Saigon cinnamon, choux pastry, and froyo (really - it took that long to add froyo?); technology - cardioverter, ransomware, troll, working memory, and the Internet of Things; new verbs - onboarding, fronting, pregaming, and face masking (again, I'm surprised some of those weren't in there already!); and political/societal terms - hive mind, open carry, concealed carry (not news here in Texas!), dog whistle, and alt-right.  I had to giggle when I saw a box on the Merriam-Webster website that included words 'trending now'.  Today's trending words are treason, redaction, spurious, malfeasance, and pissant.  Quite the commentary on today's politics, isn't it?

Clothing trends are change faster than I can hope to keep up, and sadly my weight has trended upward to the point that I don't fit into most of the fashionable looks anyway.  Somehow that doesn't stop me from buying new clothes, which is the plan, of course!  One recent trend that I wasn't even tempted to adopt is the cut out shoulder - I haven't seen many women who have successfully rocked that look.  A quick look at the Vogue website let me know that this winter, I might be on the lookout for sterling silver (fabrics, not precious metals), folk art inspired clothing, ostrich feathers, 'double denim' (please no - basically, denim suits!), plastic chic, cosy knits, multi-colored fur, gray office suits, polka dots, blankets (yay - I'm sporting one now!), galactic prints, 'left undone' (I probably have a closet full of things with hanging strings!), working girl (not anything I'd wear in an office!), sportswear (think ski jackets, not yoga pants), matrix (black patent leather), turquoise (I'm in luck!), shoulder pads (aaacckkk!), scarf prints, leopard prints, checks, wild fur, lame' (!), sheepskin, think pink, padded jackets (nooooo!), and black and blue (I can live with those).  If only I could still fit into my 80s clothing....

Even the way we shop has changed so much.  Today, most of my purchases are made online, from Amazon to Hello Fresh (hard to believe I get so much food brought to me by Brown!) and I've even been ordering my groceries online and picking them up curbside.  Most of my clothing arrives at my front door, and most of my Christmas shopping was done via Deals and Steals or Pinterest wish lists.  And Pinterest - that's a whole 'nother trend that has changed the way we do things!

Thinking of these current trends makes me think about trends that were popular 'back in the day'.  When I got married, almost 38 years ago, my wedding was my mom's party, not mine.  My duties were addressing invitations, choosing china, crystal, and silver patterns, and writing thank you notes.  My mom and Rex's mom made the guest lists, and my mom did the bulk of the wedding planning and preparation.  Our parents' friends and our family were the invited guests - most of our friends who attended were there because they were in the wedding!  When my kids got married, their weddings were their parties.  Rex and I were there for financial assistance and we showed up on the big days, but the kids did the heavy lifting.  I doubt that either of them wandered aimlessly through department store china departments (if they still have those!) with their fiances while trying to choose table settings they would rarely use.

I remember getting a phone in my own room and sitting under the covers talking on it late at night.  By the time we were married, extension phones were the norm.  My kids were in school before we had cordless phones and answering machines, and soon after that, we had our first cell phones (but no one had our numbers!).  And then along came the iPhone....life has not looked the same since then, has it?  I saw an alarming article recently about today's teens and their lack of face-to-face social contact since the iPhone was first introduced.  If you haven't read this article yet, please take time to do so today.  Not all technological advances are good for us, are they?

Finally, given my recent line of work, I think about the trends in photography that I've seen in my lifetime.  From the Brownie camera (sitting in my bookcase upstairs) to slides of my childhood (sitting upstairs) to flashcubes, Polaroids, disc cameras (ugh - my poor kids...), my first 35mm camera, point & shoots, getting film developed in triplicate at Eckerd's, my first digital camera, cameras in cell phones, my first mirrorless digital camera (I'm on my second one now), and the realization that hardly anyone uses a 'real' camera these days.  Did you know that out of the 7.5 TRILLION photos taken last year, only 333 billion (5%) were taken with a camera that wasn't also a phone or tablet?  Read more about that here, if you're interested.  And it's sad to report, but I can't even remember the last time I printed a photo!  I mean, I have books and wall art made from my photos, but I'm not good about getting my favorites printed any more.  May need to remedy that!

Last week, I realized how much trends affect my daily life -  I had no problem filling my daily images with trendy things!  I'm sure that won't change, but I plan to be more aware of why I make the choices I make.

How about you?  What trends do you notice, and which ones do you find alarming or funny or interesting?  I'm hoping that reading this blog is still a trend with you!

Make it a great week!

Jan