Been shopping? For same old, same old? Nothing makes you feel more like you couldn’t look Greta Thunberg in the eye than an inventory of all the slightly desperate things you’ve bought in the last few years. (Advance warning: The founders of The Midult wear little else)

The flowery dresses

How many flowery dresses is too many flowery dresses? You have all the floweries: bold-y ones, Laura Ashley-y ones, Georgia O’Keefe-y, maxi, midi, so polyester-y that every time you wear them you are vigilant about naked flames. And you don’t much like any of them. But you buy more and more because they are easy…

The jumpsuits

Wall-to-wall jumpsuits like you work in a nuclear plant or on a space station or with Bruce Willis and you may have to save the world or fix the sink at ANY MOMENT. This used to be a fantastic feeling: modern, bad-ass, capable, totally un-corseted? But now they just feel like a reach for relevance. Why does that feel shaming? And, let’s face it, they are not flattering. But we feel we can never let them go…

The pirate boots

Ahoy there me hearty. Who’s a pretty girl then? Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum which you are drinking in order to wipe this terrible monologue that crowds everything else out whenever you wear them. Did Kate Moss feel like this? Your timbers are shivering. Your boots are cheap and probably leaking.

The complicated shirt

This shirt is a party for one. It enters the room before you do. If there aren’t ruffles, there are awkward buttons, it is impossible to get it on or off without assistance. Obviously it is a little asymmetric. It doesn’t quite work but you persevere because you feel that it is trying to say something and you will understand if only you listen hard enough.

The boyfriend jeans

Boyfriend jeans make you look adorable, right? Wait, hold on, do you look feminine or violent? Do you look insouciant or insane? Do you look French or farmer? Oh dear.

The velvet headband

Sometimes trends come along and conspire to make everyone look like they are members of a cult. See the velvet headband. OK, so it’s a Renaissance cult but still. You are wearing it right now. It is giving you a headache because it digs behind your ears. It makes you look like a celibate blue-stocking (not that you have anything against celibacy or bluestockings). But here you are. Migrainy and unfuckable. Nice. Ditto…

The sparkly hairgrip

You are trembling with excitement as you put it on. Is this it? Is this the tiny accessory that will turn your outfit on? You look in the mirror and try and ignore the heart sinking feeling that you look like you’ve been attacked by a child’s party.

The kitten heel

No matter how many times you put them on and say loudly, ‘Well at least I am wearing heels as opposed to trainers’ or ‘I feel so ladylike’ you know that the kitten heel is a functional heel and functional is everything a heel shouldn’t be. You have given up on something and you are not sure what it is that you have given up on. You sit on the side of the bed having a little existential crisis for 20 minutes and have to take a taxi because you are late. It’s an expensistential crisis.

Leopard

Leopard is a neutral la la la you told everyone. Leopard won’t date. Leopard doesn’t homogenise. Oh how you loved leopard. Now whenever you put a leopard-y thing on, another piece of your fashion soul splinters off. Turns out leopard isn’t the cunning ruse you thought it was. Hmmm. Snakeskin?