Tag: Clothing styles

Things you didn’t know I invented

If I were the subject of a Wikipedia page, I would hope it would list three important contributions I have made to modern culture.  I invented the blitz in football, the musical genre folk rock and, in the world of fashion, wash and wear clothing.  At least, as far as I know I did. 

Trying to gasp football’s nuances

I began my very brief interscholastic football career in 1959 as a 7th grader.  The coach put me at linebacker, and I played every defensive down of every game that season. 

The instructions I got on how to play the position and feedback on how I did were limited.  At best.  I did know that linebackers stood up, unlike linemen.  I did understand that the point of defense was to keep the other team from advancing the ball.  I deduced that I should go all out to stuff any attempted advancement as quickly as possible.

So, I did my best to get directly to the ball the moment it was snapped.  I had never heard the word “blitz,” but that’s what I did.  On every single play the whole season.  In later years, I began to hear about blitzing as I followed college and pro football.  I recognized the technique.

Sometimes we switched from a five- to a seven-man line, in which case I dropped into a lineman’s stance.   I still went straight for the ball, but I guess that was not a blitz since I was crouched instead of standing. 

Was louder better?

My first guitar was a Silvertone, a brand produced and sold by Sears for not-a-lot-of-money.  It was your basic acoustic six-string.  As I learned to play and began doing some performing, I wished I could graduate to an electric guitar.  

My playing and singing at that time fell into the folk music category, including a lot of traditional tunes and maybe even more Kingston Trio numbers. 

Eventually, I was able to get an electric guitar.  I continued playing and singing the same songs.  There you had it.  Folk music accompanied on a rock instrument, a few years before Dylan showed up at the Newport Folk Festival with an electric guitar. 

Curating my clothes

Then I invented wash and wear.  Not permanent press.  Wash. And. Wear. 

As I began college, I wore to class clothes we called “Ivy League” style (which later became known as “preppy”), the pants and shirts being clean and pressed.  After classes, I went back to my dorm room, changed and carefully hung the good clothes in the closet.  With such limited wear, each shirt and pair of slacks came up in the rotation a few times in between appropriately spaced trips to the cleaners.   

That was OK for a time.  But was it worth the time (multiple clothing changes each day) and money (cleaners’ fees) to look preppy in class?  I decided it wasn’t.  Following my new plan, I just washed everything, dried it and then wore it.    

Wearing your “Sunday-best”

On Easter Sunday, the newspaper had a feature story on “Sunday-best” clothes. An on-line search reveals that it is a popular topic. It was especially appropriate on Easter because of the tradition of getting and debuting new “church clothes” on that Sunday. The article discussed this tradition, bringing back memories for me.

Our family tradition included picking out our new clothes some weeks before Easter, then putting them on layaway. For any not familiar with the phenomenon, layaway meant the store set the clothes aside for you until you made enough interest-free payments to equal the total cost. This allowed someone on a tight budget to spread the payments over more than one paycheck. Or for those tight-fisted with money, it eased the pain of parting with the whole sum all at once.

In those days, it was important to dress one’s best for church, and a little more so on Easter. That has changed in many circles, notably in those of my experience. I still see some individuals dressing a little better on Easter. I used to have a green sport coat I wore only on Easter — because I got tired of being asked if I’d won the Master’s every time I wore it on any other Sunday. When I got one of those comments even on Easter — to which I’d said, “No, it’s Easter. New life and all” — I stopped wearing it then, too.

I was a young adult, in a church where people wore anything from jeans to suits or dressy dresses, when I realized that one of the negative things about Sunday morning in the past had been the hassle of getting dressed up. And the discomfort of being dressed up. Now I could throw on whatever in a couple of minutes and not be distracted from the spiritual experience by itchy pants or choking ties.

I rarely wear a tie for any occasion. I do wear a sport coat to church and certain other places in the cooler months. It’s not so bad without a tie, plus I like having all the pockets. I generally wear my “dress jeans” — i.e., they are black — and my “dress sneakers” — also black. (I have always hated shoes. I prefer to be barefooted. So I wear the least uncomfortable possible.)

It’s just a personal choice, but I don’t wear shorts to church. I have no problem, though, with others who do. Similarly, I do not wear sports team clothing to church. Some people do. That’s their prerogative.

When I appeared as a choir member in a Playmakers Repertory Company production of “The Christians” in early 2018, we wore robes, making pants leg + shoes visible to the audience for only the two or three steps between the stage door and choir loft on our entrance and exit. Our costuming instructions were “Wear church clothes. No jeans or sneakers.”

I was amused, since my church clothes include jeans and sneakers.