Above all, don’t listen to me.  Do the opposite of everything I say.  I’m happy, I’m sad, I’m dramatic and sublime, I am everything and its opposite, but I always fall back on my feet.  I am I am… I am fashion.

Bah voilà.  It’s fashion’s fault.  One day she gives me the desire for simplicity and flats, and the next day she’s dazzling me with dizzying thigh-high boots, endless legs, silky harem pants, animal prints to burst out of Noah’s ark and too much becomes exactly what I need, what I love, just like this :

And then I go all Rachel Zoe on her : “Giovanna!  No, but you can’t go making your self a giant signet ring with your name on it?  You’re out of your mind!  That’s so awesome!  I gotta get my hands on one of those babies, right now!  And these pants… Rah, you going to get me wearing all these prints, I just love them!!!  Where did you find them, hmmm?  C’mon, who made ‘em, who, who, who?”

“What?  Kate moss for TopShop!!  Shit, okay.  But look at me,  I’m about to pass out.  You see the distress on my face, here?  I’m freaking out!  Quick, someone get me a computer.  There any left on the site?”  Giovanna cracks up at my hysterical little fashion speech.

Calm myself?  Chill out?  In the middle of a moment of utter post-recession wisdom?  Bah, okay.  In the end, it depends on where we are.  Don’t think I don’t notice when I get those hunger-pains for thigh-highs at four in the morning, a few untimely clicks over at Yoox, some irrepressible shoe urges and the slightly disgraceful desire to copy everything of my favorite stylists.

All that, it’s also got something to do with the force of seeing a whole bunch of shows, loving things, hating things, having no idea what to think of things, having an opinion in general and then finding once again that I’ve understood nothing after reading morning and night the wonderful columns of Suzy Menkes and Cathy Horyn, with whom I’ll always agree, even when they don’t agree with themselves.  Okay, in short, I’m OD’ing a little on fashion.  I’ve been taken by a fierce fashion fever.

So what?  When you catch that care-free bug, it doesn’t control you, no?  Outside of that, I have to tell you all about my latest purchase, how it happened and why.  Givenchy over at Zara, hmmm, you know, I just had to… and I’m lovin’ it to death.

Bonne journée!

Translation : Tim Padraic Sullivan