Four and Twenty: Junk Love: Enid Collins!

Tuesday, July 9, 2013

Junk Love: Enid Collins!

We Blackbirds have a lot of things in common. In fact, a couple of weeks ago, I was looking through my old photo albums in search of a picture of my brother. I never did find the one I was after, but I did find a picture of myself in kindergarten, wearing my favorite dress and a purely angelic smile. I showed it to the other Blackbird, who stared at it for a few seconds and then got up and went into the next room. She dug through her own box of pics, and triumphantly pulled out her own kindergarten snapshot.

We didn't meet until much, much later, but I think it's pretty clear that our friendship was preordained. (In the interest of full disclosure, I confess that I hated her when we met. It was our love of junk that bridged that gap, after I discovered how many collections we had in common. Or, it was her winning personality. Yeah, that was it.) Anyway, despite our similarities, we also have a lot of differences. I am a perpetual t-shirt and jeans kind of girl. She is, too, except for her tendency to wear dresses a lot. She also has a collection of vintage purses. This means that whenever we are going anywhere out of the ordinary, it involves choosing the perfect thing to wear and the perfect purse. I know, this is not a novel idea. It just gives me an excuse to roll my eyes on a fairly regular basis.

But, I have a dark secret. I used to be girly. In the era of that kindergarten picture, I was a dress girl most of the time. I especially loved stripes and rainbow colors. And, I had a pretty large purse collection of my own. And my purse always had to coordinate with my outfit. How else was I supposed to transport my fruity chapstick, handful of pennies, and pink plastic compact mirror? I hit a definite turning point a few years later (oh, the trauma of the Great Pageant Incident!), when I abandoned my beauty regime and fancy things in favor of comfort clothes with pockets. I still carry chapstick, and sometimes pennies, but always in a pocket.

However, I still love vintage purses. I don't buy them for myself, because I would never use them, but I appreciate their fabulousness. If I need to live vicariously, I buy one as a present for the other Blackbird. And, at the top of my wish list (for her, of course) is a vintage Enid Collins. Anything with classic 1960s metallic accents and brightly colored jewel critters appeals to my inner rainbow child. So, allow me to proceed with the wish list. (What makes it even better is that if I asked the other Blackbird to select pictures of Enid Collins purses without any guidance from myself, she would probably end up with this same collection of photos. Like I said, our friendship was preordained.) I want to put a chapstick in every single one!