The Floppy Hat.

I bought a floppy hat before it was cool to buy floppy hats. I don’t know if it was seen as “uncool”, but you didn’t see them in every single H&M and Forever 21 like you do now. Instead I bought mine on a “Fourth of July” sales rack at Vanity, and I’m pretty sure it was meant to be ironic. Like, “Oh my gosh, Karen! We should all wear these funny hats and pretend to be hoity-toity. It’ll be a riot!”

Who’s Karen? I don’t know.My imaginary basic white girl friend. Because basic white girls are the kind of girls who buy those hats.

So, that’s why I own one. Obviously. 

I was invited on a boat for the 4th of July a few years ago. Not like one of these party boats you see in Chicago. Not like a yacht that you see rich people have in movies. A little four person speed boat (are they called speed boats? I don’t know. I might have just made that up. But you know what I mean.Like something you see the Coast Guard Search and Rescue team in.)

So anyway. I was invited on this Search and Rescue looking boat with my friend and her family, because we were spending time at Grand Lake St. Mary’s… which consists of water so green with toxic algae that it has since been issued a Public Health Advisory. People have been hospitalized from swimming in it. A guy once walked out of it cover in slime. Like, slime. And I’m pretty sure I swallowed some of it when I was there back in 2008. But, you know, boating! Yay!

I’d just like to point out that, before this time, I’d never been “boating” before. I didn’t know what it meant, as a verb. I thought maybe there would be a “deck” and a “stern” and I’d get to lay out in a lounge chair and tan. Because, apparently, I thought that my friend and her family owned their own personal cruise ship.

So instead of showing up in cut-offs and a tank top, which would have made sense, I showed up to the toxic algae lake wearing big sunglasses, a floppy hat, and a beach cover up. Because, when I don’t know what to wear, apparently I just ask myself “What would Zsa Zsa Gabor wear?” and go with that.

#FloppyHatsAreBack