Clothes Make the Man

I am often bamboozled by people, clothing choices and the obsessive need to have the latest, greatest... or even the need to be dressed up. I am a jeans and sweater person, or (even worse), a cargo pants and tight but too casual shirt person.

This has been a bone of contention in every company I worked for that had any kind of dress code at all. Imagine what I've been experiencing the last three and half years.

I've become used to my husband. As much as Luis will not bend his will for my insane requests (put dirty dishes in the kitchen, put dirty laundry in the bedroom, please don't leave the cereal box open - note that none of the requests are quite what they should be - put the dirty dishes in the dishwasher, put the dirty clothes in the hamper, put the sealed cereal box away in the pantry), he does acquiesce to my greater knowledge of what colours work with one another. This is a miracle and a boon. It's bad enough that he is the equivalent of a 14-year-old (immature but old enough to notice hot women) but to have to walk around with a clown would be asking more than I can give.

One of my coworkers comes in impeccably dressed on or offseason, looking natty every day. The wardrobe is amazing. The colour coordination is more so. The dark teal outfit is my favourite and as ideal a colour as it is for me, it is perfection on this person.

And then there is the infamous purple and YELLOW sweater. This is a special form of torture that only a man could pull off. No woman in her worst moment of colour coordination could manage this. The colour purple actually is not the issue, it's the YELLOW. Are you wondering why the lighter hue is represented in caps? Wait for it... It's really, really YELLOW, a lurid, pulsating, brighter than the sun colour that makes your eyeballs ache. For a tent or hang gliding apparatus, this is the perfect colour combo - any jet in a 50 mile radius will see you. In an article of clothing, it is... horrifying.

I get in at 0600 (maybe 0630 in the winter - the pervasive and long-lasting darkness makes it less incentivising to awake early) and by the time the sweater bounces in, it is well past nine (if only because we don't run into one another earlier), and as awake as I am, this is an eye-opener. [Read: an eyesore.] Granted, he pulls it off better than anyone else can, but why pull it off - or on - at all?!

I keep hoping that if I make enough comments and "I'm blinded" guestures, the hint will be taken and the purple and YELLOW sweater will come off the rotation. So far, no luck.

Of course, I am amused. Horizontally striped shirts are really in vogue where I work. If this was the 1950s, an age that did not embrace the mantra "be yourself" and applied that to obesity, maybe this would look okay. Welcome to the 2000s - we are almost all overweight and perfectly okay with it (well, not really, but we all have kind of gotten on board with the idea that, well, this is me). If you want to be fat or remain overwieght that is your deal. But don't wear clothing that underscores this or makes it so much more obvious that you are lugging a few extra pounds.

Last night there were some male specimens running around with belly shirts on... and whoa Nelly, the bellies that stuck out from under. Good lord, do I ever need to see that? NO. The answer is a loud, resounding NO. I suspect that as with all bad things, the image will be seared into my aching brain for some time... or until something more horrifying comes along to erase it.

This brings us to the more fashionable and knowledgeable dressers. I have a friend at work who loves shoes and bags. She and I make fun of each other all the time. She knows designers and what they make; I know none of that. I am all about comfort; she is all about the look. It's really quite funny. But she always looks good. She wears a couple of colours that I wouldn't, but where I look rumpled and frumpy and clearly uncomfortable wearing slacks and definitely dresses, she is completely at ease dressed up and ready to go out to a fancy dinner.

She also hasn't shown up in anything that has made me do a double-take and think, "Yikes!" That's a plus. I remember Sex and the City and some of the outfits worn by Carrie... Goodness, where was that full-length mirror? Of course, my coworker is flabbergasted that I don't own a full-length mirror and worse, I'm not slightly tempted to get one.

Life is different when you are a size 16 to 18, honey. A full-length mirror is psychological warfare. So is clothes shopping, something I once loved and now loathe. And when fit people give me pointers on how to dress... forget it! Spend a day in my size XL shirts and 18W pants and then you can give advice. Until then, I don't want to hear it.

Thank you, Luis, for letting me have a hand in your clothing shopping!