After seeing the Bill Cunningham documentary and being sort of jealous that he wore the same blue jacket every day, and then reading that article by the fashion editor who bought five of the same blouse and slacks for work, I've been wondering if somewhere in the world there waited for me an outfit I could commit to five-to-seven days a week. AND THEN IT HAPPENED. Last month I was cruising the J. Jill sale rack and out leapt at me a dress that, in person and on my person, is the perfect, roomy, pocketed dress equivalent of the Cunningham blue jacket. I seriously considered going to the website and buying four more of them but in the end settled on just buying one more because the fabric is too heavy for summer in an office in an old building without air conditioning. And because I am not Chairman "Let's All Wear The Same Jacket Forever" Mao, there will no doubt come a day when I am so sick of those dresses that I will want to douse them all in gasoline and burn them on the barbecue.

So then I continued on to eBay and bought all the black cotton dresses.

Technically, the one on the far right is wool, and I'm here to tell you that the best time to be the only person to put a lowball bid on a wool dress is in the middle of summer. They are, from left to right, Eileen Fisher, Banana Republic, J. Crew, Hanna Andersson, and another J. Crew and three of them have pockets and they all fit because the sellers posted the measurements, thank you, sellers. I have been curious about Hanna Andersson forever because the catalogs are like a children's fantasy of adorable clothes that you'd wear to a gingerbread party in the parlor of the nicest grandma who loves you more than anyone who ever wore sparkly clogs, and she gave you those clogs even though your mom said they were too expensive. So it was nice to find a H. Andersson dress at cut-rate eBay prices and discover that the quality's really good and who gives a shit if you're wearing a cosy, shapeless black sack? It's a shapeless black sack with pockets.

So that's what I've been up to, gearing up to do a full Georgia O'Keeffe (she's another one, everything in black or white, lots of shapeless smocks, oh my god, SMOCKS) while the ghost of my mother looks back at me from the mirror and says, "But don't you want to wear a little color with that?" 

NEW NICKNAME FOR PEEWEE, SUMMER 2015 EDITION

Mr. Wazz-ma-tazz (after he peed on the rug) (he was ashamed, but I blame the increased dosage of diuretics)

I AM CONVERSANT IN WEE

I, as a completely sane pet owner, both sing and talk to my dog pretty much constantly, because obviously he understands me in ways other cannot. I often find myself standing in the kitchen rinsing the dishes before they go into the dishwasher with Peewee sitting nearby, gazing at my ankles while wondering why I throw out so much food that could be going quite comfortably into his mouth.

"You're allergic to chicken, Peewee, so stop sending me your mind thoughts!" I'll say.

Peewee will perk up his ears. He heard his name.

"I know you love chicken, Peewee, but it gives you itchy scabs," I'll say. "Itchy scabs are the worst. Right, Peewee?"

And then from the living room Jack will say, "Right, mom, you're the best."

I'm starting to think that someday Jack will understand me as well as Peewee does.