Casual winter days by the water call for cozy sweaters and comfortable mom jeans. I absolutely love the colour of this semi-cropped sweater. The muted purple of it also goes so well with the colour of the lake in the background. Paired with one of my wardrobe staples, the mom jean, this is a go-to outfit for me for this time of the year. Layered with a jacket and scarf on top for when the weather is even colder, this outfit keeps you toasty while still looking cute. I’ve accumulated several sweaters over the last few years, so simply changing up my sweater and pairing it with different mom jeans gives me a lot of variation on the same combo. Pretty much my cold-weather version of your classic jeans and a tee combo. My go-to shoes for this outfit are just ankle booties. With the mom jeans rolled up a bit, they allow you to show off the tiniest bit of skin as well as your ankle boots perfectly.
How perfect is this outfit for a brisk day at the cottage, sitting out overlooking the water, with Maggie Rogers’ Dog Years playing? Every time I listen to that song, this is exactly what I picture (you’ll know what I mean as soon as you watch the music video below). As per Maggie herself, Dog Years is her interpretation of what happens after college graduation, AKA the “afterlife” (fittingly named due to the uncertainty of where life takes us after graduation), and more importantly, the changing nature of the relationships and friendships that we hold close to us in the afterlife.
For me, and I think for most of us, the hardest part of moving into the “afterlife” was figuring out what the heck I was going to do afterwards. I mean, if you think about it, from such a young age, we were always in school up until the day of college graduation. We always had that daily structure in our life. Always knowing what we would be doing each day of the week, the specific classes we had from Monday-Friday, and all the homework and exams we had to cram for in between. Take that all away, and suddenly we have so much freedom and time on our hands! But having all that freedom and time was also one of the scariest things for me because I didn’t know what to do with it and where life would take me next. So of course, after a few months of being lazy and just enjoying my first summer of real freedom, I dove into job searching because it seemed like the right thing to do. Not really paying attention to what kind of job I was looking for, I pretty much applied to several permanent, full-time jobs that seemed somewhat appealing to me. I eventually landed one, and since it was the first offer I received, I took it. I was just so excited to finally be earning a real income and to be able to provide for myself comfortably.
After settling into the “afterlife”, the hardest part for me nowadays is finding the time to meet up with old friends. Work is stressful, commutes are a nightmare and the days are long, so maintaining a social life on top of that is not always the easiest. Keep in mind that everyone is on a different schedule as some friends have gone back to school, others also have busy work-life schedules, and some others have moved away. So it’s natural that due to everyone’s different lifestyle, seeing friends almost everyday like we used to back in school is near impossible. But like the song goes, when we care deeply enough about our friendships, we will always make the time for them, be there for them through thick and thin, and thus we will “be alright” in the end.
Even though it feels like it’s been ages since I was in school, today, some of my closest friends are still the ones I met in school all those years ago. I cherish each and every one of those relationships dearly. And of course I miss those days where I could see my friends everyday, but I also know that everything works out when you try to make it work. When you find the right people, make sure you savor each and every moment with them because time passes by way too quickly, life changes, and each moment is precious as it only comes along once in a lifetime.
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