Clothes Maketh The Man (and Woman)

Quajam
Originally uploaded by tozzo.

I read once that you should leave the house every day dressed as if you were going to run into your high school nemesis. The idea of this little pearl of wisdom is that if you're always feeling dressed to your best, you can face anyone and anything with your head held high.

I get the feeling that ever since I missed my high school reunion, I've been dodging some serious karmic retribution. And when I get to Hong Kong next week, I'm going to have a word with the freestanding Buddha about why he's come to collect now.

In the past week I have seen many ghosts of younger years - people who in a small town like Adelaide, I've thankfully managed to avoid. The reasons for this "duck and weave" mentality are too big and too weird even for this blog, so I'll leave you in ignorance. Suffice it to say, it IS possible to exist here and disappear into the background if you really want to.

But I suppose Buddha has made it his personal mission to make my last week in Adelaide a time to make me face up to those situations, or most recently those people, to whom I have nothing left to say. So each time, I have been forced to shuffle by and, in silence, intently study my shoes until they pass. Fortunately I heeded the advice I'd read and I was dressed comfortable on each UNcomfortable occasion. Phew.

I can only therefore wonder about the boy who shared my bus bench yesterday afternoon - what clothing advice had he read?

You know the type I'm talking about - white gangsta rapper wannabe. Like a midget Eminem; tragic really. White, old Converse sneakers, blue tracksuit pants with very little elastic in the waist, satin boxer shorts poking out about 1 inch above the top of the trackies (the boxers had little red chillis on them - a wilful euphemism on his part perhaps?). Romeo also displayed a bare pigeon-chest with a NBL basketball top casually draped over one shoulder. Hold me back.

Perhaps the only people the mini rapper should worry about running into are the fashion police.