Suitcase Series: Melissa Summers

Melissa was someone I looked up to so much during my time in college and as a newlywed. We lived in their garage apartment, and I always learned so much from our time together. I am so grateful for this time we got to catch up recently. Melissa is wearing the camisole and briefs in natural dyed stripes and the triangle and frenchies in buckthorn yellow.

Addie: Tell me about your work

Melissa: I am a nurse at an adolescent medicine clinic, and mostly I work solely with patients who have eating disorders.

Addie: How do your clothes need to be functional for you?

Melissa: I do wear scrubs, but I don't really like it, because it seems boring to wear the same thing every day, but it is helpful, because I don't have time in the morning to think about what I'm going to put on. I mostly need things that I like and feel comfortable in, but mostly that I like, which is not many things.

Addie: Does that affect how you dress outside of work? Do you have an extra craving to be creative?

Melissa: That's an interesting question. Currently, I think I'm still pretty practical, and I'm just trying to like, save money, going back to school. But I do find myself constantly thinking about pieces I would like to find to make certain outfits, that are more interesting than what I wear every day.

Addie: In my class this morning we all styled a collection, but one girl in particular, works exclusively second hand, which is such a gift, because we all know it's more sustainable, but it can be really hard to find what you're looking for. Most of us don't have that much time.

Melissa: Yes, I am very into watching people online, take stuff they buy from the thrift store and make it into something that they like. Especially like if the fabric is really fantastic, but the style is not something they would ever wear. They somehow turn it into something that works for them. It may just not be the right size.That's like a pipe dream I would love to, one day, just be making my own clothes from stuff that I buy. I've saved all sorts of videos of things to buy when I go to the thrift store.

Addie: What do you do to feel like you are showing up as yourself when you are wearing a uniform?

Melissa: I like to wear very bright, fun, tennis shoes every day, and I usually wear scrubs that are on the sportier looking side, like with joggers. I like them very very high waisted, like they might as well come up to my boobs. Those are the main things. Sometimes I take the time to put on some earrings.

Addie: What other contexts do you have to dress for?

Melissa: Not many. Running. That's probably about it. I'm not doing a lot of things besides going to baseball games and gymnastics with kids.

Addie: I always put on mascara on the way to take Efrim to fencing. Not like I really know anybody there or care what they think of me, but its my opportunity to go out and interact with adults. They don't notice, but I feel better.

Melissa: Same. I have a hard time when I have to rush somewhere straight after work, and I'm still in my scrubs. I'd rather change and put on a real outfit.

Addie: What are you listening to lately?

Melissa: I've been mostly listening to, I don't know what you'd call it. It's kind of folkish. Gregory Alan Isakov. I really like his music. I'm either listening to stuff that feels really calming, or I'm trying to pump myself up. Lately, pump myself up music would be Beyonce's new album. I'm enjoying that.

Addie: And what are you reading?

Melissa: Mostly just research for work. I have a sci fi book I've been trying to read, because I'm trying to read more fiction, something just for fun, instead of only work and self improvement, but usually the time I would read would be right before bed, but I've been just crawling into bed and crashing.

Addie: I follow a life coach type person, Stasia Savasuk, and she posted recently: Announcement: I have decided that I am done growing and self improving. From now I'm just going to be composting. I'm just going to digest what I have already learned instead of seeking something new to learn all the time.

Melissa: Yeah, sci fi is a good genre for me to try, because my brain thinks, this is not really important, but it is really good for me to think of something weird.

Addie: Imagination affects our ability to do so many other things. Of course, that sounds like the goal goes back to self improvement. It's easy to get caught up in that.

Kate: I feel like you could talk about maybe your aspirational style. I feel like you have a lot of thoughts about fashion. Like what are you drawn to? If you could pick a look.

Melissa: I feel like in some ways I've kind of lost that part of myself. Over the last several years. Ava has really been helping me, because she is very creative and very free and every day she has a new outfit on and is amazing. She pulls the weirdest randomest things together, and it's not like fashion or style like you would expect or that looks like something people would necessarily like, but it's so unique and fun, and she's so confident. She wears things to school, because I let her. My parents brought me all  of my costumes from when I was in tap, and some of them are still big on her because I was in tap until I was pretty old, but she doesn't care that they don't fit well. She figures out ways to style them and she wears them to school, and they're like over the top, and she doesn't care. I know no one else at her school is dressing as out there as she does, and she does it so confidently. The other day she wore one of Josh's shirts, like a work shirt, it's giant. It was just hanging off of her just so and she did all this stuff.  She figures out a look every day, and she doesn't take very long to do it, which is impressive to me, because it takes me a while to figure out how I want to look or what I'm feeling. She just goes with it. So, she's really helped me to want to be more creative and be more confident.

Addie: In a world where you you have more freedom, a context in which you can dress as you choose. How do you want to show up when you wake up in the morning?

Melissa: I like to be confident in whatever I wear, that it looks, not necessarily professional, but something that has an element of being sharp, but also approachable. And I like a lot of more traditionally masculine styles a lot of the time. I don't tend to like ruffles and things like that.

Addie: I feel like I am still influenced by your style during the time when we were around each other a lot.

Over the last couple of years, you have gone through some really big transitions, and changes in what the demands on you have been. Tell me about that.

Melissa: It's been…exhausting. And difficult. Life is always so much both/and. Because there are so many beautiful, wonderful things, but a lot of times it's coupled with really hard things, and it's difficult for me to have levity sometimes because of the weight of things. It brings me down more than I wish it would. But I've learned a lot about being honest and direct and not worrying about what the outcome is going to be, from that.

Addie: I was just thinking. I'm hearing a lot of, just that you haven't had time — your preference on things don't always matter when you don't have the capacity to do that. I feel like, as a pendulum swing from that being normalized for so long for women, We've had a lot of messaging of, "You're worth this! And You deserve all this!" but sometimes you can know you deserve it and you still don't have it.

Melissa: There is still like conflicting interests. For example, I really want to train really well for a trail race that's coming up, and sometimes it just means that I'm having to be gone for several hours and it's really hard to step away when it feels like I'm needed.

Addie: It's tricky for me, because we're told we're supposed to feel sorry for ourselves if we don't have time for personal things when our kids need a lot, but there is something beautiful and composting, and you have a lot of growth during those times too.

Melissa: Part of me wants time for myself, but then I don't feel sad sometimes that I don't have…

Addie: Our time with them is so small.

Melissa: It is, and I know that's so trite, but I really value family and I think that's one of the reasons why the season in parenting is difficult, because as they grow, that's not always something they value. You want to be together and experience the world together, and they don't always want to do that.

Addie: It's been especially funny homeschooling as someone who always wanted to dig into everything, and that's why I'm homeschooling, and then having kids who are like, "Eh. I don't care."

Melissa: Yes! I've been running up against that too, because the things that I thing would be fun, or am offering up for us to do, just no interest

Addie: One metaphor that's been healing to me in that area is Charlotte Mason talks about homeschool curriculum as like spreading a feast, which can feel like a lot of pressure, and you have to provide so much variety, but I've heard other moms say, "You go to Christmas dinner and everyone brings their favorite things, and it's all nostalgic, but nobody eats everything on the table." So we can give them so many options and it's okay if different kids leave different things sitting in the dish.