Y’all Be Acting Way Too Tough; Throw On a Suit, Get It Tapered Up

My relation to fashion is changing. (Yeah, this is a gonna be a shallow post.)
Time was, you wouldn’t catch me dead in a collared shirt unless it was $2 from a thrift store and “matched” a spiked bracelet I was wearing that day. I went through the later part of middle school and a fair portion of high school in punk-cum-raver garb, rocking record label t-shirts and phat pants. I had a few pieces of passable dress-casual clothing for work, but being in the tech industry nobody ever really dictated a dress code to me. And it’s not like coming into the office in chinos and a polo does a fat lot of good towards looking passable if you’ve got 2ga spiked tapers in your ears.

I got in the habit of keeping a very small wardrobe, even by straight guy standards. This was an extension of my overall minimal/portable lifestyle, the product of bouncing between parents’ houses and spending a good many months in preparation to run off (whole ‘nother story, folks). By the end of high school and my first year of college I got by on about three pairs of jeans, a pair of nice black slacks, a very small assortment of shirts and sweaters, and maybe three pairs of shoes. When friends who shop at American Eagle tell you that a few more clothes wouldn’t hurt, you’re wearing your threads out.

But in the last few months I’ve gotten tired of the same old shabby casual sweaters, slouchy jeans, and generic black t-shirts that I got by on throughout my freshman year. Maybe it’s being back in the city once or twice a week for work, or maybe it’s just growing the fuck up, but I’m increasingly uncomfortable in public unless smartly dressed. Even if it’s a t-shirt and jeans kinda day, it’s gotta be a nice fitted t-shirt and decent jeans. But most of the time I much prefer something AX, Kenneth Cole, DKNY, and so forth. I’m not rocking Gucci on a student’s budget, but if I had the money for it (and enough left over to ease my conscience through charity, something I already do), I probably would.

There are a couple caveats to all this. For one, it’s not like this is the first time in my life I’ve dressed well. I’ve always had a couple sharp pieces of clothing on hand, and even my casual selections fit a respectably hip urban color scheme. And further, I still shy away from paying exorbitant sums for shitty fashion, like Diesel. In DC’s upscale Georgetown shopping district last night I couldn’t tell the difference between the crap in Diesel and the drab indie uniform garb in Urban Outfitters, save that some of the Diesel stuff looked more uncomfortable. I’m still only willing to pay for what I think is worthwhile, and thankfully even cheapie H&M can do right by me in that respect.

It’s odd being well-dressed on my campus. I feel out of place until I Metro into DC for work and suddenly: people who give a shit about their appearance. It’s odder still being a straight male techie who dresses well; hackers I meet are suspect of my abilities until we get to talking. And lastly, it’s odd being into (though not exclusively) SuicideGirls -lookin’ ladies when you’re all Kenneth Cole. It’s tough to find alt-girls who aren’t looking for a scruffy never-be rockstar boy, and tougher still to find stylish girls who aren’t shallow or overdressed.

I don’t have any fashion guilt, though. It’s disingenuous for upper-middle class kids to be going around in trashy indie clothes as pricey as something sharp just to claim some sort of proletariat solidarity. There needn’t be a disconnect between looking elegant and professional and having a social conscience.

So these days, I’m with the Jigga Man on this one: “I can’t let a day go by without me bein’ fly or fresh to death/Head to toe ‘til the day I rest/And I don’t wear [raver pants], I’m [twenty] plus/Give me a crisp pair of jeans, nigga, button up.” What more can I say?