the black dress

Today is a short day, I'll be leaving at 2pm to meet Katharine at St Peters Church. We are going on an expedition to find me a black dress. As yet, I'm not sure whether we will be successful. Although I know what I don't want, I'm not quite sure what I do want, which makes shopping for me, remarkably difficult.

I haven't had a black dress since I was an insect thin size eight, in my late teens and early twenties. I can't believe that I've gone the last six years without one, and the other day it got too much for me. I decided, whilst jotting down a list of things to do in my moleskine, that a black dress is a priority, a necessity. I must have one. And I must have one before Christmas. I suspect that jotting down things to do whilst watching "What Not To Wear" from the corner of my eye, is something I should do less of, it could get expensive.

I would like to have found the perfect dress, miraculously, in time for this evening. The girls are coming around for wine and nibbles to welcome in Christmas. I imagine smoked salmon, asparagus spears, thick lumps of melt in the mouth Camembert and glasses of dark rich red wine, and me, back straight, smiling in my beautiful black dress.

I know that by five o'clock I'll be tired, frustrated and in need of a bath to calm my nerves, but I'm crossing my fingers that, somehow, I find the dress and all will be right for an evening.