x doms, denim and donatella x
random connections, an unspoken social scale and feeling well(ish) - inside and out.
as an empath and a highly sensitive human (hsp) being social and doing stuff out in the world is - complicated. the world praises extroversion and for a long time i thought i was an extrovert. i love people, crave connection, enjoy conversation and a fun time, however i only feel fulfilled when i’m with like-minded people. it’s easy for me to feel sensory overload. having your tribe and an appropriately decibel-ed environment is essential for a successful social time - if those ingredients are lacking, it will probably royally suck.
the process of discovering your people, places and how to feel joy - not dread - from plans takes persistence, self- examination, honesty, awareness and good coping skills. one of mine is an unspoken social scale. it determines how much energy, planning and re- charging i’ll need after leaving my house. a game night, a tea date or a hike with a friend hits differently than an event requiring makeup, walking a carpet, or making small talk. when possible, i like my social activities to be spread out. give me a day (or a couple) between things, please - but this past week i had 4 consecutive days of plans and god forbid, a double - 2 plans in one day. talk about a doozie.
it started thursday evening when a new friend who shares my love of jlo (don’t come for me) suggested we watch “this is me … now: a love story” jlo’s new film. it’s neither a music video nor a movie - according to jen it’s the greatest love story never told. to me it was more like a therapy session musical … or a vanity project. whatever it is, it’s bad.
jlo became an object of my admiration after i saw selena at the tender age of ten. i thought she was incredibly beautiful and i wanted to be her. that hasn’t changed. and two years ago when she liked an instagram photo of raven and i posted by justjared, i felt giddy and then questioned if she runs her own account. despite having no desire to watch this film, my friend initiating a hang was appreciated and it was a low energy plan according to my “scale” - i didn’t have to leave home and sweats were acceptable.
after 60mins of jlo song - splaining her love for ben, my friend told me she had once worked as a dominatrix, as one does after watching bad jlo content. my curiosity was piqued and i had questions. why? how? was it scary? did you make a lot of money? is it a word of mouth kind of industry? i didn’t want to overwhelm her so i simply said, “oh cool, how’d you get into that?”
“it started with the outfits - ” she said, “- i just wanted to wear them.”
as our conversation went on i was reminded of an old friend of mine - let’s call her jade - who used to work at a place called the donatella den (dd), a bdsm dungeon in nyc.
jade’s decision to work at dd was not motivated by fashion, but the need to make rent. she was a twenty- something in the city, trying to survive. two hours with a man (in theory) sounded easier than working at starbucks. and maybe it was “easier” - but that time in her life came with consequences named trauma and shame. one of our lighter conversations went something like this —
jade: one of my regulars at the dungeon was this married orthodox jewish guy who was into spanking.
me: being or doing?
jade: doing.
me: how’d you know he was married?
jade: he told me plus he wore his ring.
me: so he’d just come in and spank you?
jade: yeah, but in jeans. he brought a new pair every time he came in, which was like once a week. and then for an hour i’d wear them and he’d spank me.
me: specific. did you get to keep the jeans?
jade: yeah. he came in so often though that by the end of a month i’d have like 10 pairs. i sold a lot of them to consignment shops around the city.
me: we talking gap? levi’s?
jade: versace. always versace.
i still wonder how many women are walking around in jade’s second hand versace - fettish - jeans. now that’s some sisterhood of the traveling pants shit.
as my new friend continued talking about her work as a dom, my mind swirled with memories of jade, dd and versace jeans and i couldn’t help but think how ironic it was that tomorrow (friday) raven and i had plans to attend an event hosted by - yep you guessed it - donatella versace.
friday was going to be a bump up on the unspoken social scale. unlike my thursday night couch hang, what i looked like was going to matter - glam and outfits stress me out. i’m not one of those girls who enjoys the process of getting ready. it feels like work. hard work. but i’m trying to learn how to make it fun for myself. i started following some makeup tiktok girlies. katie jane hughes is one of my faves. she’s taught me how to properly line my lips and use contour to make my face look snatched! i follow along, step by step like a furniture instruction manual and eventually like a piece of furniture, i’m put together.
but last friday was not my night. i tried doing a bolder eye, but the result was low grade eye infection. the outfit i’d visualized in my mind didn’t work in reality and i was feeling very tired (i haven’t been sleeping or functioning well, because my ribs are sprained, a story for another time), but if going out when you’re feeling well feels like a chore, going out when you’re feeling unwell, feels like going to war. the good news is, i’m used to battling myself. over the years my healthier, less self critical and judgmental voice has gotten stronger. so it’s easier to tell the part of my brain that says i’m not pretty enough, or cool enough, or made up enough to shut the fuck up and get in the car.
we arrived around 7pm. thirty minutes before donatella and dwayne wade were scheduled to address the crowd. one thing about me is i love a schedule, which is why work- related social events are easier for me than pure social, like a late night birthday party. hard outs are my shit! i also like to know where and what floor i’m going to because i hate elevators. lucky for me, this event was on the roof. so as we took a few photos on the carpet, i was mentally preparing to play sardines in the one and only elevator. 💫 coping mechanism note: when taking elevators i sing tiny dancer 💫
there was a line of people waiting to get onto the elevator and as we stood in place, my anxiety grew. either get me on and off or i’m going to need to find the stairs! as we were making small talk, i reached my “oh hell no!” moment when i saw the elevator door momentarily stall from the corner of my eye. i started looking around for someone working the event. when i found him i went over and asked if there were stairs. he looked at me, slightly concerned and said, “yes, but it’s like 7 flights.” and that was fine with me! i let raven and her platforms off the hook and told her i’d meet her up there. 7 flights later and only slightly winded i’d arrived. raven did about five minutes later because elevators are slow!
we posted up by a heat lamp and did what everyone does at these events - look around to see if we recognized anyone and quickly look away if eye contact with a stranger is made. i was already ready to go, which is typical. moments later, two older gentlemen, who happened to be twin brothers, came up and introduced themselves. one said, “i finally said fuck it! i’m going over to them and saying hi! and i’m so glad i did because it feels like we've picked up right where we left off.” and he was right - it was as if we’d all known one another forever. it’s moments like that, which remind me how being social and putting yourself out there is worth it, because making new friends, who feel surprisingly familiar is lovely.
soon after, one of raven’s friends appeared and we had a little group going. donatella arrived followed by dwayne and the crowd started to gravitate towards our hosts. raven announced, “i’m going in!!” she grabbed my hand, i grabbed one of the twins and we pushed our way through. we reached dwayne, raven hugged him, his wife gabrielle and their daughter zaya. donatella and dwayne took to the stage and shared their remarks about the lgbt center, which the event was celebrating.
now it was officially time to go. raven led me towards the elevator and i reminded her, “stairs babe” - as we entered the stairwell, a bleach blonde glimmer caught my eye - it was donatella. we descended down behind her and when we reached the bottom she looked back at us. in a thick, smooth italian accent she said, “con - grat - u - la - schons on chur marriage.” obviously, we took a photo and as i stood next to her, i thought about versace jeans, the iconic green dress jlo wore to the 2000 grammys and how badly i wanted to say, “father, son, and house of gucciiiiiiiiiii.”
saturday was another bump up on my unspoken social scale. it was double plan day, which followed our evening out, so i had a significant amount of anticipatory dread. but my rumination around things is often far worse than the thing itself. friday had been easy and saturday i woke up feeling pretty grounded. i went about my usual morning routine - exercise, shower, get ready, protein shake - and then we headed to our agency’s oscar brunch downtown. i wore double denim aka a canadian tuxedo - one of my fave put together, yet comfy looks.
despite making a decent amount of small talk with a bunch of agents i didn’t feel like i was being drained of life. the typical, gross hollywood energy wasn’t there. growing up in the industry, now working in it for some time, being in rooms with studio types is not foreign territory. i know how to talk the talk, but it’s still not unusual for me to feel somewhat invisible in these environments. people are drawn to faces they recognize, names they know and are quick to overlook others. it’s part of showbiz babe, but it can still sting. about forty minutes after we arrived raven gave me the look - it was time to bounce and activity number 2 of 4 was marked complete. your girl was half way through.
after leaving the brunch we had a spontaneous meet up with two of our friends who happened to be downtown. i rarely do anything spontaneous, but by the end of that hang i felt content. they are for sure my tribe. now my focus shifted to getting through the rest of the afternoon and maintaining enough energy for event 3 of 4 - purely social - a birthday party at the w hotel with a 10pm start time. not that anyone asked, but i don’t think anything other than a red eye or a movie should start at 10pm. spoiler alert - i didn’t make it. somewhere in the 5 o’clock hour a wave of tired hit me, i tried to nap unsuccessfully. the battle in my brain had started and with each passing hour got worse. i teetered back and forth between, “i think i can! i think i can?” to “stay home! you’d rather be cozy?” it was fomo vs jomo right up to the valet at the w hotel. and then my shit hit the fan.
the night life crowd 99.3% of the time is not my people. i actually have a fear response to it and this particular saturday, as i sat watching people shuffle into the hotel and stand in line for the club entrance my 36 year old self was replaced by my 6 year old self. the pressure to decide what i was doing was getting to me and the proof was in my pits, which were sweating actual beads. and then the things in my head started coming out of my mouth in a rapid, indecisive, confused verbal diarrhea storm.
raven, who is not an hsp, which doesn’t mean she is insensitive by any means, was literally like “wtf is happening to you?” and the only way i could think to explain it was like a brain circuit malfunction, which i didn’t say out loud. “so are you coming or not?” raven asked me for the umpteenth time, and as i watched a tipsy woman with legs the literal size of toothpicks attempt to maneuver down the sidewalk in 8 inch heels, i said “no. consider me your uber for the night. please give me 5 stars. your trip is now complete. love you bye!”
on my drive back home i felt like a failure. like a totally abnormal, dysfunctional person. how’s it possible that all those people could be there, having fun, carefree, and in the moment, yet my experience was the opposite. i mean shit, i couldn’t even get myself to the place to have the experience. old familiar feelings of being different, wrong, and broken surfaced. and then, enter the fear thoughts - a million “what if’s” and worst case scenarios looping around in my mind like a carousel gone haywire. i’ve learned how to silence some of that by breathing, trusting and focusing on things like my baby toe. safe to say, that night ranked high on both my unspoken social and “tell me you have a dysregulated nervous system without telling me you have a dysregulated nervous system” scale.
when sunday rolled around we were both exhausted. event 4 of 4, elton johns annual oscar party, was that evening. we went in 2022 - the year will smith smacked chris rock. and ironically enough our outfits were giving dominatrix (meets eddy scissor hand) vibes. looking back at this photo two things come to mind:
i can’t believe i had the guts to wear that dress … or lack of dress.
i was early to the re-birth of the sheer dress trend, which is currently everywhere.
as different as raven and i are in social settings, we are simpatico when it comes to chilling. she loves sweats and the couch as much as me - her relationship is just more balanced and 3 events were enough for her. we sent our regards to sir elton and decided to have our sunday be what the good lord intended - a day of rest and no chick-fil-a.
later that night, i was back in my preferred spot - the couch - in cozy pants with a heating pad on my ribs. like a good hsp, i re-played and processed the last few social days over in my mind. i felt well(ish) about how i’d done and most importantly was reminded - the unexpected can be rewarding, triggers are indications of unfinished work and in our own unique ways, we’re all just seeking spaces inside and outside ourselves where we feel regulated.
then before going to deep into my brain hole - i opened instagram to see who wore what on oscar night. and call it whatcha wanna call it, but the first photo i saw was of donatella versace - because everything, is always somehow connected.
What a weekend right babe! But you look amazing red carpet or not!
Love you bigs. I think you did great.