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pictures rolls and rolls of photos. It's one thing to touch and feel a polyester blend
blouse, but to see a photo of me actually wearing it proof, if you will was
inexplicably more disturbing.
I'm sure the Bee Gees look back fondly on their black poly/rayon/fire hazard shirts
and think, "Oh, yeah, this is when we became millionaires." But when I look at my
wearable fire hazard, my thoughts aren't as glamorous they entail a desk job at
Hertz and wine coolers at Doc McGee's Crab Hut. That was the one fantastic thing
about those shirts: They went from day to evening, which is always a fashion plus.
Who wants to go home and change, thereby increasing their chances of missing
happy hour?
Why did I save all those clothes? I felt like that guy with amnesia from Memento.
I'd pick up a pair of stirrup pants and an image would flash into my head: me
standing in front of a mirror thinking, These are really slimming. Then all memories
of that outfit and time would disappear.
I started combing the photo albums, mesmerized by this girl who was in no shape
or form the person I am today. Lots of shots of me and pleats. Me wearing pleats,
me enjoying pleats. Pants, jackets & Pleats on jackets? That's clearly wrong. Yet I
thought they looked great. In one picture I am standing with this woman I worked
with and we are both wearing what looks like trousers from a zoot suit. I added a
backwards snap cap. Plus, the top of a Navy uniform. Were we on the lam? Maybe
on the way to an audition for Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo? It didn't even look like
me.
Several other photos revealed me wearing a series of paisley vests. In one I had a
watch in the pocket. Let me just say that one more time. I had a pocket with a
watch in it. I had a pocket watch. Apparently I waited for trains a lot. That's the
only reason I can think of for needing a watch in my pocket. On the other hand,
that's really all those vest pockets were good for; maybe I thought it was a shame
to let them go to waste. Either that or I used to be a hypnotist.
It started to occur to me, if I'm horrified and possibly scarred for life after looking
at these pictures now, in twenty years will I look back in shock on the clothes that
were in my closet today? Will I think, Why in the world would I wear Puma running
shoes with dirty denim cargo pants? No, of course not. That is a perfectly timeless
outfit. In fact, it's retro. It's back for a second round. Maybe that's why I saved all
those clothes at my mother's place just in case they made a comeback.
I pulled out some painter's pants. I don't think they're back yet, but they reminded
me I need to paint the hallway. There were lots of thrift store men's blazers too. I
checked the pockets and found a ticket stub to an Elvis Costello concert his
glasses are still in, but not the jacket.
How do people decide what's back? More important, how do people decide what's
never coming back or what clothing is over? For instance, unless you were going to
dance class, when did it become not okay to leave your house with jazz shoes on?
Obviously, when the time came, the upper fashion echelon signed a bill or
proclaimed a style exodus, or sent out carrier pigeons, or maybe they just phoned
each other, I don't know saying a decision had been made regarding bolero
jackets or parachute pants, and that they were never to be worn again.
How do the average people of the world receive this message, this change in the
fashion tide? I don't recall anybody ever telling me, "You need to take off that
zipper shirt and put one on with the neck and sleeves cut off of it. Immediately!
They're watching!"
It was always kind of a slow metamorphosis for me. I'd find myself walking around
and noticing nobody was wearing the things I had on or had hanging in my closet.
I'm sure people were secretly pointing at me.
"Look how high her shoulders are."
"Her buttons are huge!"
"What, is she going to lift weights with that wide belt on?"
"I guess she didn't get the newsletter."
As I sifted through the pictures, I found that the older I got the less my clothes
stood out. Then I looked down at what I was wearing that moment: a long-sleeve
T-shirt and a pair of 501s, an outfit that has been around since the Gold Rush. Yet
I wasn't wearing this or a variation of these timeless pieces in any of the photos,
and I know I have owned them at every stage of my life. Maybe subconsciously I
only had my picture taken when I was wearing something that would later
embarrass me. Or maybe I thought, Hey this is a great outfit I'd better document
it for a future retrospective. The world will want to see. Just like the Jackie O
exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum last year. A museum showing one woman's
wardrobe. Hmm. Turns out she didn't wear a lot of bolo ties.
I boxed up my clothes, prepared to give them to Goodwill, and then thought, In
ten years I might want to look at these again not with regret, but with confidence
that the clothes I will be wearing then could just as well be the clothes I wear
now only dirtier and with more pockets.
naming my book: the odyssey
Lhe funny thing is, to fully understand how and why I chose the title The Funny
Thing Is& for my book, we need to go back in history. Remember the year "Billy,
Don't Be a Hero" was a huge Top 40 hit? Well, luckily we have to go back much,
much further all the way, in fact, to 1454 or 1620 or the early or late fifteenth or
seventeenth century. I can't really say for sure because I'm getting all of this
secondhand.
Anyway, sometime, a real long time ago (about a decade before the introduction of
books on tape), the Bible became the first book published for the masses. Who
knew this amazing achievement would one day result in books with such titles as
Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus and Jesus for Dummies. Yes, it's been
a long, strange journey.
Over the years, as more books were published, it became necessary to name
them. Today, just as in 1454, if you stroll into a Barnes & Noble you need to know
the title of a book in order to find it. I wanted to be sure, so I decided to test my
theory in an actual bookstore:
BOOKSTORE CLERK: Can I help you? Are you looking for a particular book?
ME: Yes, I am.
BOOKSTORE CLERK: Do you know the name of the book?
ME: Actually, it doesn't have a name.
BOOKSTORE CLERK: Please, leave my store.
Interesting. Next, I tried the same experiment but this time I asked for a book by
its title:
BOOKSTORE CLERK: Can I help you? Are you looking for a particular book?
ME: Yes, I am.
BOOKSTORE CLERK: Do you know the name of the book?
ME: Yes. Do you have The Complete Illustrated History of Cinnamon-Flavored
Dental Floss, the waxed edition?
BOOKSTORE CLERK: Please, please, leave my store.
Very interesting.
So what did I learn from my experiments? Well, nothing really. Yes, they did
reinforce my hypothesis that a publication with a name fares far better than one
without. But I wanted to do things a little differently to truly distinguish my opus
from the others on those crowded bookstore shelves.
What if my book had a title like the Beatles' White Album just a color instead of a
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