I met this lady at the Further With Ford Conference.
We had breakfast at the same table earlier that day, so when I saw her during a tour of Ford's Dearborn Truck Plant later, I spoke. Nothing serious, small talk. I work at Glam.com. I have a blog I neglect. The usual.
If I’m being honest, New York kicked me in my *ss last week in a major way.
My mother came up from Pennsylvania on Friday to see with her own eyes that I was okay. I don’t care that I’m 27 and I needed my mom. And I don’t care if you know that, either.
"You're really beautiful," my on-camera coach told me as I washed my hands after using the restroom. Our eyes met in the mirror as she finished, "but you must know that."
She continued on--stay with me, asking, "where are you from? New York?" "The men must love you there," she said, sure of herself.
Here's the thing, my darling New York. As she said this, I couldn't help but make a face.
I lightly touched on this before with you. Perhaps, my tone came across like I was joking. I wasn't. I'm serious.
Leave me alone.
And, shut up.
One of the first writers that I was ever drawn to, fashion-wise, was Zandile Blay. She was the market editor at Paper magazine, Style & Culture columnist for the Huffington Post and then became the fashion editor at Essence.com before leaving for Nigeria to become Editor-in-Chief at Hello! Nigeria. She's back stateside now, working as a fashion/beauty journalism professor at Syracuse University and Editor-at-Large of Scene magazine.
I say all that to say, I was taken with her. The way that her words came alive on my screen. She starred in a Coach campaign. The way her clothing was so magnetic. Her jumbo quilted Chanel. She was brown and fashion writer. Most importantly, she was accessible. 23-year-old me was a goner.
