Let’s start with the most controversial thing about me: I’m an Aries. I would like all preconceptions about Aries to come to a halt right now. I’m just kidding. And, like I’m working on my anger issues okay? All kidding aside, I am understanding, ambitious, confident, passionate, honest, determined, and every other overused positive adjective that people use to describe themselves.

I can be positively impulsive as well, and this website is a perfect example of that. One Monday night, I was watching the TV show “One Day” (thank you, TikTok for encouraging me to watch a show that ripped my heart out with its bare hands!) and, for some reason, my attention abruptly shifted to freaking out about my future and possibly having to live with my mom for the rest of my life. So, I thought, “Hey, why don’t I just make a website?” Fast forward to midnight that same night, you can find me sitting here, on my laptop, and making this thing you’re reading. I feared that this would become just another one of those ideas that leave as quickly as they come, never to be thought about again. If you’re reading this, then it was absolutely not one of those fleeting ideas and, probably–hopefully–means that I am actually proud of myself.

I was a multi-sport athlete from ages four to nineteen. My life practically revolved around them and, for a moment there when I stopped, I felt like I lost key parts of my personality and would never get it back. If you’re in that boat, I’m here to tell you it’s not true–life goes on. That is, unless you played sports until the age of twenty, then maybe you’re screwed. I am saying this not because I think writing about sports on a fashion website is a good strategy, but because I want this site to serve as an example that, even when you feel like there has been something of importance stripped from your life or identity, there is still so much beauty that you have not come remotely close to discovering yet.

Basically, I am just another person preaching that everything happens for a reason. Except, I mean it and truly believe it. Our lives are separate little games of dominoes–each crappy thing leading to the next crappy thing until something comes along that is not so crappy. Here I am, writing a summary about myself that people are, hopefully, reading. All of those lows that have acted as invisible teachers have somehow gotten me here, in a class where I should be taking notes but, instead, I am writing this. And, it has been so worth it.

I found love, confidence, and happiness through fashion. Don’t start thinking that I am some superficial person, though. From the bottom of my heart, fashion made me love my life because it made me love me. This year, my junior year of college, I finally feel like I have embraced every aspect of myself and displayed it through my style. If I like how something looks and feels, I do not question what other people may think anymore. This website would have never happened a year ago, the idea of people not liking it or laughing at it would send me back into the hole that I laid in for so long.

Publishing and advertising a website would have sent high school Analese into a coma. Is that word inappropriate to use in this context? Probably, however, that is what fashion is–a unique expression that is not always loved by everyone. That is my favorite part about it, and I want this website to help people find themselves, love themselves, and truly just be themselves. So please–indulge, laugh, judge, hate–I will take anything really. I appreciate it all.