CW51: Happy Birthday Jesus

24.12.2024

It feels hard to type, because the only pair of tights my mom could give me were bodyshaper tights. I fear I can’t break, I fear I won’t make it to our family’s Christmas Eve dinner.

If I don’t make it, please like subscribe and share, it’s what my spirit would want.

It is also a bit funny that I would be offering you this lookbook today, given I spent one hour this morning going through my and my mom’s clothes and being completely overwhelmed by how uncool I looked in each and every outfit I tried on.

I had a whole big text prepared for you about my relationship with English and being afraid of losing a part of me if I lose my fluency, but in truth that’s a topic I’d like to explore more in depth, so perhaps I’ll dedicate a full space to that sometimes in the future. I just owed it to this week’s self to mention it, to make you all aware that that is something I’ve been struggling with lately.

Before I leave you with this week’s newsletter, merry xmas!! If you celebrate, I hope you’ll have a wonderful time with your family; if not, I hope you have a slay sunday… a slayday if you will.

PS. I went and changed my tights because I really wanted my grandma’s pasta with clams 😇 

THE OUTFITS

Day 1: On Monday, I did something out of my comfort zone: I talked about my racist driving instructor to one of my coworkers. This is a person I would really like to be friends with, but I know that so far we’ve never discussed anything remotely political.

It is part of my growth journey, though, to not hide parts of myself from people I want to be close to. I have done that plenty in the past and someone gets hurt in the end.

In my pursuit of the middle ground I end up erasing myself until I can no longer take it, the person ends up with a friend who is not the person I would like to be and it is a mess. I would like to make friends who actually like me, and not the meek version of Vittoria I have been portraying for the world.

Just to clarify, it is not controversial to call out racism. It is hard for me because I did not know what to expect from the other side, and since I am new and I have no friends, I was going for a “don’t ask don’t tell approach”. But that’s stupid and cowardly, so there.

Day 2: keeping up with the theme of day 1, I have started developing panic attacks before my driving lessons, which is the worst possible outcome. It is at this point that I should note that I never meant to create a newsletter about racism or - even worse - white people and racism. This is what moving to Italy does to a m’fer.

On this day, I made the conscious choice to not wear make-up. My relationship with it is complex: I don’t want to be a person who never wears it and I don’t want to be a person that always does. Maybe I could be both, maybe I need to explore whether wearing make up brings me joy that actually speaks to my joy,

or if this joy is tied to my desire to belong to the in-group.

Day 3: I had a half day at work, because I was traveling back home for xmas 🥰 Unfortunately, 20 minutes before leaving I realised I had made a mistake at work and it all went downhill from there. I spiralled, cried in front of my manager and began my self-pitying cycle, one that had begun at my last job and whose effect I’m still trying to move on from.

I wrote about it here, because I felt totally powerless.

Writing about it made me also reflect on my relationship with creativity. This year, I have slowly started accepting that I am creative, and that with that comes having to try and mostly fail.

I was thinking about my creative journey and my need to start multiple projects and then get disheartened when I don’t immediately get the readership or the following I want.

I asked myself “who do you write for?”.
I guess the answer is I write for myself, but I write for an audience too. Because I would like to be recognised, I would like to be seen, I would like for someone to reassure me that my words and my thoughts are enough, and that maybe I don’t need a 9-5. Other than sick PPTs, all I can offer to this world is introspective analysis, that’s the only skill I have that does not relate to marketing. Of course, I also love discussing marketing, but I am trapped in this skillset I built at 18 and that I am grateful for but I am not always fulfilled by.

Day 4: I was meant to be in back to back meetings, but my boss’ boss decided I was too low in the ladder to deserve a seat in the room. Whatever, perhaps she was right, but I was still feeling shit about myself from the day before, so I was overthinking every question to my manager, every small detail, every imperfection. It felt like an impossible task, to see the bright side.

I did watch the new Percy Jackson over lunch and omg!!!!! I love it!!!!!!! if you were a PJO fan, this is for us. Percy, Annabeth and Grover are just so perfect and it is just heartwarming to relieve a part of my life I was afraid to face, because it’s so deeply tied to a former friend.

Day 5: I was WFM, convinced I was a step away from being fired. I did not feel like taking a cute OOTD picture, so I tried being playful and I went for the classic “celeb apology in their guest house” look. No earrings, no make-up, white back-ground.

Turns out my manager is not a monster, and actually wants to find ways to support me and work together. Could you imagine???

Thought of the week:

I think contracts are so cute, so human. You sign a paper and you pinky promise to the other party and to the law that you will do what has been agreed upon. I just can’t believe a document I wrote with my ten fingers is enough to stop someone from discussing sensitive information.