Prepping for Graduation Day

March 10, 2010 - 1:57 PM

This weekend, I was showing my friend Kinsley around Portland and introduced her to Lloyd Center. Yes. The lovely example of Portland's...most diverse shopping center.

So we kicked off the experience at one of the mall's finest examples of its overall demographic: Marshall's. Kins and I toured the significantly reduced-price items and found some atrocious things. There was a one-piece bathing suit with gold logos covering its white fabric that was cut like a halter-topped pair of booty short overalls.

Yes.

Well as we meandered, we actually found some things that would be worth a second look. As we approached the spring dresses, my interest piqued. I am always on the market for a flattering 40's style spring dress that compliments my full figure.

And then I found it.

It was white with medium-sized subtle white polka dots. The waist was tight but the skirt and shoulders were full. Kinsley immediately suggested it as a graduation dress to wear under my cap and gown. She has been talking about this a lot lately, and I had no idea that it was even something people thought about-well at least no further than contemplating the classic nude approach. But I considered the dress for a moment as something dainty and classic to wear on a day that I will remember for the rest of my life.

It was beautiful, but a little out of my price range, so I left it in the store but haven't forgotten it since.

A few days later, I was reading a book by Lynn Peril that my Women's History teacher recommended: College Girls: Bluestockings, Sex Kittens, and Coeds, Then and Now.

As I was deciding on a section to peruse before falling asleep I came across one titled "Graduation and After."
Because I will be graduating in a little more than three months, I decided that this chapter might prove interesting and applicable.

So I opened the page to find that the opening topic was what to wear to graduation.

Apparently the early female college graduates were expected to wear a dress likened to a dress that would be worn at a confirmation or a wedding. They were expected to present themselves as pure and simple as possible.

"Well into the twentieth century, the ‘traditional' commencement outfit for girls was a white dress, whether she was graduating from college or high school. ‘The first effect of the graduating frock must be simplicity,' reported the New York Times in 1894. ‘The sheerest of lawn, the finest of lace, the most diaphanous of petticoats floating over the lightest of silk foundation-it takes all these with the freshest of ribbons and the most immaculate gloves to produce the finish of simple purity and unadorned beauty.'"

This "virginal femininity," as Peril puts it, may not be as applicable today, to say the least. But hell, women still wear white on their wedding days, so for lack of a better term, f*ck it!

Eventually, the authorities lightened up and allowed both men and women to don the now-traditional cap and gown, which, according to the author, came about in the late nineteenth century.

I like the idea of maintaining your femininity (even if it isn't virginal) while wearing a cap and gown to signify one's achievement and competency. I am all about the best of both worlds.

So maybe I will go back to Marshall's and pick up that dress after all. I think one thing is decided: I will be upholding the notion that women are soft and kind by wearing white on graduation day while acknowledging my competency and education by sporting the same cap and gown as my male classmates.