LT: Make It Work!

For the past two and a half years, I have been a fashion school widower. In the Spring of 2004, Lil’ Thunder undertook to achieve a lifelong dream by quitting her 9-to-5 and enrolling in fashion school. She had dreams of holding court backstage in Milan, Paris and New York, yelling at cocaine-laden waifs to put down the celery and contort themselves into an apparatus ill-equipped to cover their naughty bits. OK, that last sentence is completely untrue. She had dreams of getting a job where she designed, made and sold good, high-quality clothes every day.

So, off she went, naive and idealistic, the perfect target for a beat down at the hands of the fashion school powers that be. And beat down she was. Since matriculating, she has regularly had weeks of under 25 hours sleep. Her world has become marathon stretches of being hunched over a computer, placing virtual buttons on the virtual dress, trying to find where that one goddamned file went, or just praying that the p.o.s. doesn’t crash. All but one of the 15 students that she began with had dropped out within 6 months, and the work only intensified thereafter. I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this already, but I am a law school grad (an Ivy League law school grad, no less). I can say without reservation that Lil’ Thunder has put in at least twice as many hours in fashion school as I did in law school. And she hasn’t played beer pong during that time once!

The hours spent hunched over the laptop have been almost all in front of the TV. And thank God for Tivo – we have used ours to death (good thing i went with the lifetime subscription). The show ranked #1 on our season pass list is Project Runway. Now, I’m not much of a reality tv fan. I don’t watch any of the popular shows (though I do religiously catch The Contender and Top Chef – you should too). However, for Lil’ Thunder’s sake, I watch Project Runway (that’s my story and I’m sticking to it). The show has a lot going for it: bitchy contestants/designers, a non-English speaking host, the world’s ugliest models (click through to the headshots. Fugly. Ugh, I need to link to one more), and a random gay man fluttering about, delivering motivational lines. But the real reason for watching is the runway show at the end of each episode. The designers trot out (and I do mean trot) their models, covered with designs that are often laughably horrific. Then three judges (Gay Snarky Designer Guy, Little Bitchy Critic Girl, and a rotating guest judge) rip on the designs. Its all a big, gay bitchfest, and if you know Big Thunder, than you know that is what I’m all about.

Anyhow, the best Project Runway moment of the three seasons on-air (and yes, I’ve seen every moment of every season) was a runway show not too long ago. One of the doomed designers had made a dress that had a slit in the front that left little to the imagination. When the judges met to critique the work, Michael Kors (Gay Snarky Designer Guy) commented on the inappropriate cut of the dress, “I know what she had for lunch.” This quip sent the Thunders rolling in hysterics. Know what she had for lunch – classic! Maybe it doesn't come across in text, but the delivery was pure genius. After about two minutes of laughter, we simultaneously stopped laughing, looked at each other, and asked, “What the fuck does that even mean???” The conclusion was that we have no idea what it means, but we love the line. You’ll be seeing it on the Spike in the future.

But I digress. This post is not about a cheesy reality show, its about the girl I love. Tomorrow morning at 9:15 PST, Lil Thunder will walk into a room, armed with about 40 designs and various other trinkets. Like the Project Runway contestants, she will present her final portfolio to three bitchy judges. And she will knock their motherfucking socks off. You see, not only am I overwhelmingly proud that she simply persevered with finishing the program, but she did so while displaying incredible talent. She consistently puts out great designs. She is a great designer.

When she walks out of the room, it will all be over. Tomorrow night, I’ll take her out for some celebratory cocktails, and when we get home, we are gonna jump straight into bed and ... well, at that point, she’s going to go to sleep for about 36 hours straight. But after that, we will start all over again. Enjoying the city with each other, no huge obligations over our heads – we’ll be like newlyweds.

Um, and if anyone in New York City is looking to hire a great designer, shoot me an email.