I’ve been in Japan for the past week, and it has been incredibly therapeutic. This semester has been chaotic, and as I ramped myself up for Big Ten travel and midterms, I desperately needed a taste of home to get me through.

So, after some good food, great vintage, old friends and a visit to the shrine today, I feel ready to reflect.

But there’s one topic I haven’t been able to get off my mind lately, and that’s Halloween. This year, I am so excited to celebrate, as I actually haven’t had a Halloweekend since high school — I’ve gotten the flu every year, believe it or not — so my fingers are currently crossed. Having my costume preplanned and ready to hit “checkout” online, it actually took me a while to decide what I actually wanted to go as.

Interestingly enough, one costume that TikTok has often recommended to me as of late is a ladybug — a play on the growing polka dot trend.

It’s funny to think of dressing up as a cute — or sexy — bug, even if you believe the insect is adorable to begin with. But it also made me think about how social media categorizes types of pretty according to different animals. With trends and makeup tips to be bunny cute or deer cute, fox pretty or cat pretty, it reminds me of a friend I have, Dariya, who once showed up to our dinner wearing — and frequently wears — antlers as part of her outfit.  

It reminded me of a thought I had in December about the cruelty of being human sometimes, and if girls are destined to become animals. It’s a crazy thought to have, and I was in my “thought daughter” mindset, but with so many videos of girls talking about being animal pretty, it made me consider if we find solace in the perceived lack of complexity in these mammals. 

Stay with me for a second — we frequently joke about how nice it would be to live the carefree life of a beloved house pet, just as I laugh at photos captioned “I’m just a girl” or “literally me” that is simply a photo of a bunny or a hamster. Because we live in a self-centered, human-centric world, we believe the “head empty,” carefree style of life applies to those we observe, live around and dote on, like the currently viral Moo Deng and Pesto. 

Even more crazily, I understand the desire not only to be more than just human but also to become and emulate the beauty we see in things we pass by on the daily, like fruit. I want to be elegant like a cherry, naive and innocent like a pistachio, and I empathize — and tear up — at the lyrics of “Watermelon” from the film “Dinner in America” (2020): “I’m a watermelon slammed into your driveway / Crack me open so I feel the air inside me.” 

So, I thought on the train today, maybe it’s a case of human ego and a mid-senior-year crisis, rather than a desire to look like an animal or a snack. But when I came back to the hotel room and looked in the mirror, I thought, “My hair is so curly and my eyelashes look so long. I look so beautiful, like a snow leopard.” And before anyone thinks I needed a nap — it was only 2 p.m., and I no longer had jet lag. 

So, this being a fashion column, I looked at the relationship between animals and clothing as I went back out. Not only are there blatant associations between animals and insects with luxury brands, like the Bulgari serpent or Japanese streetwear brand CUNE’s main characters being a bunny and a parrot or even the name “Onitsuka Tiger,” but also the patterns and prints are seen everywhere.

Whether it is the actual animal knitted into a sweater or the pattern of animal spots or stripes replicated on jeans or the literal hide used for jackets, bags and loafers, fashion is undoubtedly in a deep relationship with animals. Everyone knows the fight for fair and ethical fur usage, either through efforts and protests from PETA, general advocacy or laws enacted to protect animals, but this doesn’t mean synthetics aren’t still widely used to replicate this desire to wear and feel like these animals. 

Interestingly, though, fur has become a symbol of apparent luxury. Most likely due to ancient tales of hunting and using hides to symbolize wealth and power, it transitioned into a public and wearable declaration of status, like the wearable version of taxidermized mounts. 

As wealth and society changed to where we are now, I find it almost ironic that the status of rare crocodile leather bags and calf leather heels demonstrate the top because of the proximity to nature around us — sort of like this quote from Aravind Adiga’s book, “The White Tiger”: “See, the poor dream all their lives of getting enough to eat and looking like the rich. And what do the rich dream of? Losing weight and looking like the poor.”

Maybe the reality is that as we grow and become complex and learn to adapt to challenges rather than attack all of them, we turn back to the simplicity of those around us that are similar but not the same. We find solace in the supposed happiness of a deer running in the woods or a perfectly round bunch of grapes or dandelions’ pappi blowing in the wind. 

But a welcoming desire to draw these connections won’t make our humanity go away. Still, I choose to love and accept myself in the form, species, mindset and place that I am, because if I won’t be me, and if you don’t play you, then who will? 

The grass is always greener, but the grass in my yard can be as green as I please. Maybe the buzz of Tokyo and being home-home has helped me practice much-needed meditation, but I understand that I am in charge of my mindset, my clothes and my reality. And if that means that I find myself to be the most beautiful when I “give” apple skin or a cat, then so be it. Meow. 

Hadyn Phillips is a senior writing about fashion in the 21st century, spotlighting new trends and popular controversy in her column, “That’s Fashion, Sweetie,” which runs every Wednesday.