—
くたびれた
糸のほつれに
風が通る
tattered threads
a breeze finds its way in—
the fabric remembers
—
If I had to wear one outfit forever, I think I already know what it would be.
Not because I’ve planned it.
Not because I’ve studied form or function or read about minimalism in some clean Scandinavian font.
But because I’ve already worn it. Not always the same exact pieces, but the shape of it. The story of it.
When I was younger, clothes weren’t something to choose.
They were something you inherited, something someone else outgrew or outloved and passed on to you.
Jackets with loose zippers. Shirts with fading logos in languages I couldn’t yet read.
Nothing ever fit quite right, but I never asked it to.
Back then, clothing was survival.
Warmth, decency, the small hope of looking like the others.
And sometimes, looking like the others was enough.
—
Later, somewhere around seventeen or eighteen, something changed.
I started noticing how other people wore their identities.
How a scarf could be defiance.
How a coat could whisper confidence.
How shoes, even cheap ones, told stories if you knew where to look.
So I started caring.
Not in a loud way.
I didn’t become fashionable. I became intentional.
It felt like trying to find a voice, but using fabric instead of words.
I remember exactly when I bought that leather jacket.
I was nineteen. Still too broke to be shopping.
Still measuring every meal against how many coins it cost.
But there it was—hanging in a store near the central train station. Dark brown, asymmetrical zipper, just stiff enough to feel like it meant something.
Seventy percent off. Still a fortune.
I bought it anyway.
Paid in cash, my hands shaking slightly.
And I wore that jacket everywhere.
Not to show off.
But to remind myself that I could choose things now.
That I wasn’t only made from hand-me-downs.
That I had become someone who could decide.
I still have it.
The seams have softened.
The color has deepened.
A small tear at the shoulder, patched by someone I loved once.
Another one on the cuff, never fixed.
It has more character than I do on most days.
—
Then came the Ljubljana years.
I lived in a flat in Šiška, just above a tiny burek shop.
Greasy food, warm and subsidized, the kind that filled your stomach and your chest if you let it.
The flat was drafty and loud, but it was mine.
I ran through Tivoli in shoes not made for running.
And I started to realize that simplicity wasn’t just a lack of money.
It was also a form of clarity.
Natural fibers. Earth tones.
Wool sweaters that you could wear four seasons a year if you knew how to layer.
Pants you could bike in and sit cross-legged in.
Shirts that frayed at the edges but held your scent like memory.
I began to mend.
Sewing buttons.
Patching knees.
Reinforcing seams with tiny, invisible stitches.
Not to save money.
But to stay connected to the life the fabric had lived with me.
—
In Birmingham, the jacket came with me.
It got rained on more than it should have.
It dried overnight in damp kitchens and cheap university rooms.
I wore it to lectures, to parties I didn’t enjoy, to the market behind the Bull Ring, where I bought eggs and bread and learned to cook things slightly better than before.
There was no glamour.
Just layers.
And weather.
And learning that clothes can become companions.
I didn’t want to look expensive anymore.
I wanted to look like someone who listens.
—
Now?
I wear soft things.
Natural things.
Things that wrinkle but breathe.
A linen shirt I bought in Japan after getting lost in a town that had no convenience stores, only silence.
A scarf my sister gave me before I left home.
A wool sweater I found at a flea market and washed three times until it smelled only like me.
Sometimes people say I look like I live in the forest.
Sometimes people say I dress like a painter with no paintings.
But mostly, no one says anything.
And that’s how I know I’m doing it right.
—
If I had to wear just one outfit forever?
It would be this:
A pair of dark cotton trousers, soft and broken in, that I’ve patched at least six times.
A black linen shirt with frayed cuffs.
Wool socks.
Shoes I can walk twenty kilometers in.
A scarf for the wind.
And that old leather jacket, still holding on.
It’s not stylish.
But it’s quiet.
It doesn’t introduce me before I speak.
But it listens.
And when I walk into a room, it doesn’t shout.
It just arrives.
—
Wabi-Sabi Lesson
Let your clothes age with you.
Let them soften and fade and fray.
Mend them not just to fix—but to say, I stayed.
You don’t need new things to be a new person.
You just need to choose.
Wear something long enough, and it becomes part of your story.
Love something long enough, and it begins to love you back.
—
The older I get, the more I care less about how things look and more about how they live.
How they move.
How they hold shape when I’m tired.
How they remind me, in the mirror, that I’ve been here.
That I’ve walked through rain.
That I’ve made it this far.
And still—
soft.
patched.
quiet.
alive.
life 