Road Apples by Tim Sanders
June 28, 2010
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A cloud of dust and a hearty "Hi Yo Sanders!" My wife and I have the following conversation on a semi-regular basis: “TIM!” “What?” “Come here! You can’t leave the house like that!” “Why not? Something wrong with the door?” “Not with the door, with your shirt. Just look at it! It’s all pulled down in the front and hiked up in the back. We’ve been married for over 42 years, and you still don’t know how to put on a shirt.” Unfortunately, she’s right. When it comes to dressing myself, I have what most objective observers would call a serious impairment. And when it comes to maintaining my wardrobe while wearing it, that serious impairment often turns into a frightening major disaster. I’ve had the condition since childhood. I believe it’s a kind of clothing dyslexia. If you were to look at my childhood photos, you would discover a common theme. The theme is clothing-related, and it always evokes questions like: a) What happened to your left sock? b) What’s that on your shirt? or c) Why didn’t your parents tell you to zip up your trousers before they took this one?” (Since this column deals mainly with clothing dyslexia, I won’t even mention the various alarming hairstyles I sported during my youth, most of which involved lots of Brylcreem All-Weather Power Grip used to sculpt a very sturdy, manly, wind-resistant flat ridge of hair jutting skyward at the very front of my head which closely resembled the dorsal fin of a bluegill with the fish still attached. By which I mean the flat ridge of hair resembled a bluegill, not my head, necessarily. Sadly enough, at the time I thought I looked really spiffy.) In my younger years I was satisfied as long as I could wear my black Hopalong Cassidy shirt–the one with the stunningly attractive yet very masculine steer’s head embroidered on the front pocket–and turn up the cuffs of my Levis just like Gene Autry did. When I was in kindergarten, our class put on a circus in the school gymnasium for parents and other hapless relatives who couldn’t come up with credible excuses not to attend. Based on skill levels, some of the children were assigned jobs as acrobats, and some were given cats to serve as lions for them to tame. Since I was much too clumsy to work as an acrobat, and also allergic to cats, I was told to dress as a clown and pass out balloons and refreshments to audience members ready to pony up ten cents. But I was a hardheaded kindergartner, and while I did eventually agree to peddle the merchandise, the clown idea was out. I insisted on wearing my Hopalong Cassidy outfit, complete with black shirt, black Stetson hat, Levis, multi-colored cowboy boots, and red suspenders. It was my favorite outfit, and even though the teacher prohibited me carrying my lever-action carbine, which shot actual corks, I felt that I could still maintain my dignity and make a non-clownish fashion statement at the same time. I have a photo my parents took before that circus fiasco, and I looked like a pint-sized Porter Wagoner in all my finery. By the time the evening was over, I looked like a pint-sized Porter Wagoner who'd just lost a food fight, with beverage stains all over my shirt. The stains were due to the fact that all of those balloons made distributing the beverages and putting the cash into my cigar box very difficult. And since somebody had taped all of my balloon strings together, distributing the balloons was even more difficult. There were some serious problems with the lion tamers that night. Their cats were unnerved by the crowd and very uncooperative. But I was preoccupied trying to retrieve my balloons, which a well-meaning adult had managed to cut loose and release into the bleachers, so I missed most of the really great cats-run-amok excitement. It was only the beginning, as far as youthful clothing mishaps went. I was a lot like the Charles Schulz character “Pig-Pen,” who was always covered in grime and surrounded by a cloud of dust. I didn’t do anything to deserve my grime and dust, it just seemed to sneak up on me and attack when I wasn’t looking. I had friends who could go everywhere I went and do everything I did, but remain spotless. I could have resented this and grown bitter, had I been that kind of a kid, but I was better than that. Instead I simply resigned myself to my disheveled appearance and sort of forgot about how I looked. That doesn’t mean that I didn’t try–I did. I went through phases, especially as a teenager, when I worked very hard at improving my appearance. In those days black Levis were very popular, and I was careful to iron mine before wearing them. Of course, as you’ve probably already guessed, my ironing skills left a lot to be desired. Most of my Levis, black, blue, or indifferent, had not one crease down the front, but three or four. And my shirts were ... well, let’s just say it was obvious that I picked them out myself. After we were married, Marilyn spent considerable effort trying to dress me correctly, assuming that after awhile I’d get the hang of it myself, but it never worked out. I still wear Levis and T-shirts in the summer, and Levis and long-sleeved shirts in the winter, always with tennis shoes. I still have a talent for soiling my shirts, long or short-sleeved, with food and other things, due to my natural debris magnetism. Marilyn does try to check me out before I leave the house, but sometimes she is busy elsewhere when I leave. She asked me to be sure and mention that, so that no one would blame her if they spotted me at Walmart amidst a cloud of dust and grime, wearing that stupid Hopalong Cassidy shirt I bought last month on eBay. |