Come Out In The Open

I am sitting on a chair outside a shopping mall. I see people - some well dressed, others not so - moving in and out of the mall. I hear them talking, laughing, walking in silence. One thing that I have grown up doing is observing people.

And I see a pregnant lady walking towards me, she sits on the chair and makes a call to her friend. "There is nothing in this whole goddamn city that I can wear and look nice," she says. I, who was just going through my Facebook wall with posts with headlines like 'From Blake Lively To Kareena Kapoor, we bring you the best of pregnancy style, get confused.' Is it really the case? Sadly, it is. At least in India. 

Almost a week later I read that Sonia Rykiel, the French fashion designer has died. Rykiel was not just a fashion designer. She was a fashion designer who changed the rules of the game.

When Rykiel was carrying her second child, she could barely find maternity clothing that she would like. All she saw was clothes that screamed shame and apology. So Rykiel designed her own outfit. Needless to say, it was not even remotely apologetic.

“I wanted to show the world how happy I was,” she said. “My mother-in-law was scandalized, but my friends asked how they could find one like it.”

So, there you go. Someone simply  needs to start it. Others will follow suit, sooner or later. May Rykiel's soul rest in peace. And may, we, as a generation, too realise that it is time we stop hiding and come out in the open and celebrate, wearing good clothes, of course.

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