A League Above

I will preface this by saying, "I'm sure they're all very nice," but last night, I went to a book party for Jill Kargman's The Ex-Mrs. Hedgefund and was scared out of my mind. It was like the Stepford Wives had all flung their flaxen hair and metallic Chanel purses at the innocent people of Chevy Chase, MD (well, as innocent as they can get with Jimmy Choo, Louis Vuitton, and Ralph Lauren as fellow residents). As a former member of the Junior League of Washington, I can report, this crowd was like the Junior League raised to the power of 57,000.

I'm sure my discomfort says way WAY more about me than it does about them, but it was still a pretty disconcerting experience. I came wearing a vintage Pucci dress and black gladiator sandals and felt woefully uncool and underdressed. All around me were red carpet women with glowing skin, bouncin' and behavin' hair (so much for my chic little bob), and enough designers on their body to repopulate a small country. The party was a Nanette Lepore, but the attire was more like the second floor of Neiman Marcus threw up all over the room. In a good way.

Luckily, my friend Carrington knew some people and the highlight for me was when one of her friends asked me about my own book. When I told her it was about the year I spent subscribing to women's magazine, she said. "Oh, like Dee Dee Myer's?" Which made absolutely no sense to me (granted, the party was loud, so maybe she thought I thought I used women's magazines to rule the world), but her comment totally made my night.

And even more luckily for me, my wonderful friend Joyce Neave was in attendance. I thought one or both of us would get whiplash from all the looking around we were doing. "Why can't everyone just wear name tags so we can debrief later?" I asked her. "This is not good for my ADD," she admitted.

In the end, I came away with an autographed book (Kargman has the most miniscule handwriting of all time), a mini Nanette Lepore umbrella, and a store gift card. And a curious desire for a metallic Chanel purse so I could gain brief access into this beautiful little world.