la la labels

Girlfriend?

At 28 going on 29, I am still not sure how I feel about the label of ‘girlfriend’. I love labels, in fact, in my early 20s I became a sort of label-whore, aspiring to own as many high-end designer labels as was possible for a broke college student. Among my early and most prideful labels: Dolce & Gabbana, Prada, Marc Jacobs, Stella McCartney, Max Mara, Burberry, Donna Karan, Grey Goose, BMW, and on and on. Labels were a way to give myself a feeling of individuality and more importantly, a feeling of importance. Labels made me feel like I stood out and like I was somebody to envy and I was somebody to know. Labels did for me what love did for others –gave them a feeling of worth, a feeling of being someone special.

Over the years I came to realize that no matter how many labels I owned, I still struggled with feelings of emptiness, that no label (well, maybe Chanel or Vuitton) could fill. I started to understand that my labels had led to a false sense of importance. It wasn’t labels that I needed to make me feel important, it was me. Living in Chi Chi and being able to afford less labels, has meant that I have had to learn to identify myself in new ways, learn to feel special because of who I am and not what I own. So in the last 2 years I have traded Prada for Club Monaco, Dolce for Crew, Stella for BCBG, Grey Goose for Yellowtail, and finally, “it’s complicated” for “girlfriend”.

Yes, that’s right, I am trying on a new label called girlfriend. As I said earlier, I am not really sure how I feel about the label girlfriend, I am not sure if it will fit me. Due to my lack of experience with this label, I feel more fear of it than the sense of security it is supposed to provide. I mean with designer labels I am guaranteed a certain level of quality, I am guaranteed a perfect and tailored fit, I am guaranteed a warranty, I am guaranteed public approval and admiration, bluntly, I am guaranteed satisfaction. A label of girlfriend guarantees no such thing, if anything, the only thing it really guarantees is that you have more to lose if something breaks, especially if it can’t be fixed by the shoe repair guy.

So why give in to the label? If I have comfortably given up on my other labels, why take on this new and riskier label? I guess that the main reason is possibly that while designer labels are great, there is no life-time guarantee, they eventually show wear, go out of fashion, lose their appeal, in short, they are a depreciating asset. The label of girlfriend in contrast, can appreciate in value and it can last a lifetime. I guess at the end of the day, I am willing to risk a break for the chance of the optimal life-time satisfaction.

Big and I are officially together. Although he (and I as well) do think labels are a bit ridiculous, I needed to have something that signified that he and I were moving forward. He and I are faced with so many roadblocks and obstructions to our physically being able to be together right now, but the difference is that he and I are both committed to being together emotionally at present, and physically when time permits. I guess while I have fought having this particular label, I have decided that I also need it as a way to demonstrate and symbolize my commitment to Big and to our future. So yes, you can think of me as Big’s girlfriend, but please just don’t call me that to my face :).

Girlfriend.